IMPOSTER
by Scarlet Garter
Summary: What really happened in Dallas, TX , November 22, 1963? Who were the shooters on the grassy knoll? Chance is sent back, not to prevent the assassination of Pres John Kennedy, but insure its success. Can he live with himself after pulling the trigger? Characters include Julia the Witch and various historical persons of the 1960s.
1. Chapter 1

**IMPOSTER**

**AUTHOR'S NOTES:**

The author makes no claims upon the Human Target characters and is humbly grateful for the opportunity to play with them.

The historic characters mentioned in this story are either fictitious, or portrayed in a fictitious manner.

The story takes place immediately after _CHRISTOPHER CHANCE, JULIA THE WITCH, AND THE GUNFIGHT AT O.K. CORRAL._ Familiarity with that story will lend continuity to this story.

_IMPOSTER _is dedicated to retired Secret Service Agent Clinton Hill, upon whom my Agent Cliff Hall is based, and whose tragic role in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy pointed me in the direction this story follows. As of this writing, Mr. Hill is alive and well, and has published his own book, _MRS. KENNEDY AND ME._

Feel free to skip the prolog for now and scroll ahead to Chapter One where our favorites step on stage. But please come back and read it before you read the epilog.

* * *

PROLOG

the Land of the Fae  
[June, 1963, Mortal time]

"I want to return home," the man said.

And he was a man, despite the Little Lord Fauntleroy cut of his brown velvet coat and doeskin trousers. His feet were a dead give-away, large and somehow ungainly despite his otherwise masculine grace.

The woman he addressed - if woman she was - reclined beneath a weeping diamond tree on a silken pallet. Her tiny feet were bare, her garments more shadow than textile - sunlight filtered through flower petals.

She gave him a condescending smile. "Why ever would you want to do something so…injudicious?"

"Because it _is_ my home."

"This is your home." Her arm made an encompassing gesture at the surrounding Faeriescape.

The glittering fairyland in children's tales and folklore no longer existed. At some point, the inhabitants grew weary of golden trees with emeralds for leaves, of silver grass meadows dotted with ruby and amethyst blossoms, with crystal palaces and black agate castles on the horizon. Combining their magic, they turned the whole of Faerie into a rustic Eden. True, the willows still wept, shedding diamond tears of no less than 3/4 carat, and the occasional sleeping-apple tree had to be chopped down and rooted out, but lightning-bugs no longer sparked St. Elmo's fire in the meadows. Sprites flitting over fountains to sip droplets of champagne spat out the plain water they discovered spraying forth, and swiftly learned to soar high above streams where multi-hued minnows had become voracious rainbow trout.

Milk-cows grazed in clover-filled fields. Wild brooms roamed the hills. Sheep browsed unfenced pastures with faithful Hellhounds or imported llamas keeping watch for the occasional marauding wolf. Hens clucked and grumbled, teaching their chicks not to swallow the twinkling gemstones scattered on the ground unless they needed grit for their gizzards.

A few crystal palaces remained, but for the most part such structures became quarried stone or annealed glass block. Farm cottages sported frumpy thatched or shingled roofs. Private dwellings in villages and towns assumed the appearance of any prosperous middle-class abode, little different from their counterparts in the Mortal world.

"It's not where I was born," he said. "My homeland calls to me."

She sighed. "I don't even remember where I was born. A cabbage patch, perhaps. But an enchanted one, mind you."

He said nothing. Merely looked. In truth, he would miss the privilege of looking at her. Of making love to her. The pleasures of her making love to him. But not enough to make him stay.

She sat up, reminding him of a cat which suddenly spied another, invading its territory.

"Your place there is taken. He has a mate. Offspring. An important position."

He'd seen them. A lovely wife. A girl and boy he already yearned to cuddle or swing high in the air. He said, "A position _my_ father bought for him. Which he is eminently unqualified to fill."

"And you are?"

He touched the crimson sash crossing his chest from shoulder to hip, symbol of bestowed nobility gained through valor in battle. "I've survived here well enough. No easy task, you'll concede?"

The Seelie and the Unseelie Courts had been at each other's throats since before the first human ancestor ventured down from the trees. When warfare was not open, internal jealousies and strife, schemes, plots and counterplots made the days of armed conflict seem peaceful by comparison.

"_He_ almost started World War Three," the man continued. "Ordered an innocent woman murdered to silence her - "

"Innocent? A prostitute?"

"A movie star! Even so, she didn't deserve execution. Bring him here where he can dally as he pleases and cause no further mischief. Or return him to wherever you found him. A cabbage patch, perhaps."

The woman didn't smile. "He has the right to stay. We found him there."

The man's head jerked. "How - ?" I thought your people had to be born in Faerie."

"Halflings are like lambs. Ewes birth them wherever they may be."

"He's a _halfling_?"

"Is that so surprising?"

"No…I suppose not. But I've always believed I was…exchanged for a Fae child. One from here."

"You were exchanged for a Fae. Just not a full-blood. You wouldn't have survived more than a few months on their - your - side. We substituted a child who could."

"He's not as robust as he appears. He suffers many ailments. Has since childhood. Hides them."

"The result of mixed ancestry, I suppose." She hid a yawn behind fingers too long and delicate for a human's hand.

"He'd be better off on this side. The Mortal world safer, too. I'm strong now. Healthy. I want my birthright."

"It's his birthright as much as yours."

"His! My parents aren't his parents - "

"One is."

For a moment, the man's lips moved, but no sound emerged. Finally he asked, "My father…sired him, too?"

The woman - if she was a woman - laughed. "Your mother is pathetically faithful to her vows. Your father makes no secret of his affairs. One of his was one of ours. Haven't you ever wondered why you and Jack Kennedy look so much alike?"

* * *

CHAPTER ONE

San Francisco, California  
the present

"My name is Christopher Chance. Tell me how I can help."

The woman on the monitor screen started, then her gaze found the camera lens. "Thank heavens. You're the man I was told to find. I'd almost given up. Mr. Chance, my name is Jacqueline Kennedy. I believe someone is plotting to murder my husband, John."

The woman speaking was the wife of John F. Kennedy, America's 35th president.

Chance would have been far more astonished by this had he not just returned from Tombstone, Arizona. Arizona Territory - 1881, to be precise. There, impersonating Doc Holliday, he joined Town Marshal Virgil Earp, his younger brother Morg, and the flamboyant gambler/to-be-Deputy U.S. Marshal Wyatt Earp to defeat the outlaw Clanton gang in the gunfight at O.K. Corral.

Not ten minutes ago, he had strolled into the conference room, to be confronted by Guerrero, mad as a scalded rooster over the malfunctioning computer system.

"I don't know what program you let your ladyfriend install, but it's over-riding anything I try to do."

The 'ladyfriend' was Julia Hastings, witch.

It didn't seem possible such creatures existed in the 21st century, but how else other than through witchcraft could someone explain being transported to a parallel universe more than 120 years in the past - on a broom.

Chance eyed the malfunctioning computer's monitor. He had wanted to research the gunfight where Wyatt Earp was killed, so Julia downloaded a program allowing him to access the Library of Congress records in the parallel universe where it happened. They didn't uninstall it. Now the program seemed to have monopolized the entire computer system.

"All it will let me do is this," Guerrero had told him, and pressed some keys.

After a moment, the screen cleared. A woman's face appeared on the monitor as if she stood before a webcam. "Please…I'm not certain I'm operating this…device correctly but the matter is urgent. If anyone can hear me, please answer."

Chance had stared at the short dark hair, the huge dark eyes. Her air of wealth and exquisite breeding was apparent even on the flickering monitor. The desperation in her voice compelled him to speak without considering the consequences.

"My name is Christopher Chance. Tell me how I can help."

**... ... ... ... ...**

"That was Jacqueline Kennedy," Ilsa said, now. She sounded as dumbfounded as Chance ever heard her. "How is that possible? She died in 1994. Didn't she?"

"Sounds right," Chance said. "But I shook hands with Wyatt Earp just a couple of days ago, and he died in 1881 or 1929, take your pick."

"Assuming we're not suffering a mass hallucination," Winston said, "how did she manage to contact us? What 'device' did she have that could reach us from…when? She must be speaking from the early 1960s. Were computers even invented yet?"

After a moment when no one answered, Guerrero said, "Kennedy's national defense team, especially McNamara, were way into computer technology. The RAND Corporation was the largest source for computer programmers. They were deep into planning defense strategy. They programmed the original automated air defense and radar systems. Probably through terminals in the situation room connected to serves at the Pentagon."

"Where did you come up with all that?" Chance asked.

"Dude, it's me."

"But were those computers sophisticated enough to communicate with ours?" Ilsa asked.

The words "even using witchcraft" hung unspoken in the air.

"It might not be RAND's equipment," Chance said, not trying to hide his excitement. "It might be something even earlier. World War Two. Tesla and Einstein collaborated on the Philadelphia experiment. Trying to make our warships radar-invisible. Maybe what she used was something Tesla designed to allow contact with the Eldridge while it was cloaked. She got us by accident."

"Someone just left it for her to find, I suppose," Winston said.

The computer chose that moment to emit a series of beeps and blurps, as if attempting to tell them about the 'device'. Maybe it was. The thought made the hair rise on the back of Chance's neck.

"It's not impossible," he said. "Roosevelt had a war to win. He would have wanted first-hand information on the experiment. He might have demanded a means to speak with the Eldridge's captain from the White House. When the experiment was abandoned, so was the device. Stowed away on a shelf somewhere. I've heard the White House is a labyrinth of forgotten rooms."

"Sometimes, Chance, you sound like a walking Wikipedia."

Chance gave Winston his hurt look. "No more than Guerrero does."

"Yeah, but he's talking computers. You're talking weird science. Or just plain weird."

"Listen, guys," Guerrero said, "I hate to break up this mutual admiration confab, but we need to get Chance's ladyfriend back and find out what she did to our computer system. Maybe then we can figure out how to un-do it, so we can all get some work done!"

Wish me luck, Chance thought, knowing how difficult contacting Julia could be. To his surprise, she answered her cell phone on the third ring.

"I can be there in 45 minutes," she told him. "Shall I bring lunch?"

"How do you suppose Jacqueline Kennedy knew to ask for you, Mr. Chance?" Ilsa asked when he'd hung up.

Chance dragged his gaze away from Ilsa's crossed knees. "It must have been one of the others she wanted to reach." Early on he had discovered obituaries for three prior men bearing his adopted name. To avoid confusion, he labeled them by location and year of their demise, or, in the instance of Minnesota-27, faked demise. Later he discovered two more. "Probably Reno-78."

"The next question is, who told her to ask for him," Guerrero said.

"A better question might be _why_," Ilsa said. "Kennedy was surrounded by Secret Service agents whose sole duty was to protect him."

"We know how effective they were," Guerrero said.

Chance's sympathies were with the Secret Service agents. Kennedy himself had said anyone wanting to kill the president could do so. He made it sound easy. Almost a dare.

"Besides, except for her own SAIC, she didn't trust them," Winston said. "Didn't know who to trust. Who could you turn to when rumors had it the Mob was after him, the CIA wanted to eliminate him, even his own VeeP hated his guts. She must've heard all that, and more."

"Of course there was a plot," Ilsa said. "I don't doubt it for a moment. I've never believed in that lone gunman rubbish. Neither did Marshall. He said the 'magic bullet' theory was nonsense. But she must have trusted someone enough to go to with her fears."

"That would've been Cliff Hall," Winston said, and every eye focused on him. "He was her Special Agent in Charge. The one you see in the Zapruder film, climbing onto the limo's trunk after Kennedy's shot."

They had all seen the film at one time or another. Chance, maybe Guerrero, too, had seen the _other _film, the one the Old Man possessed. It was Joubert's film that came to Chance's mind as Winston spoke.

"The Zapruder film is a sham," Ilsa said. "Designed to make it appear Lee Harvey Oswald shot Kennedy from behind, when in fact two shots came from in front. The infamous 'grassy knoll' the Warren commission so blithely dismissed."

Chance eyed Ilsa with renewed interest. "I didn't know you knew so much about the assassination."

"Perhaps not so much the assassination - that was Marshall's pet _bête noir_. But I know a little about Jack Kennedy. He was one of ours, after all. He visited Ireland, you know, in 1963. Not long before he was killed. The people adored him, even in Belfast. It was hoped he might bring about a united Ireland."

Overshadowed by his _Ich bein ein Berliner_ speech, Kennedy's stop in County Wexford to visit his ancestral homelands did not receive the publicity his visit to Germany garnered. Nevertheless, his stay in Ireland endeared him to the hearts of the entire country.

"Somebody didn't like him," Winston said.

Chance saw Ilsa bristle. Quickly he asked, "Why do you think the Zapruder film is a fake?"

"Marshall didn't think, he _knew_. He had a top laboratory examine a first generation copy. They could see where someone altered the original, transposing some frames, removing others, splicing in some from another film altogether. Zapruder wasn't the only one filming that day."

Tell me about it, Chance thought.

"And they got away with it for over forty years. Would have gotten away even longer if not for the phenomenal advances made in photography and computer manipulation. Computer enhancements bring clarity to details unimaginable only a few years past."

Chance wondered if the 'someone' who altered the Zapruder film had borrowed frames from the Old Man's film. Marshall's lab scored a bull's-eye with their conclusions. The shots came from behind the stockade fence atop the grassy knoll as witness after witness had insisted. The Old Man's film captured the shooters' every move, if not their individual identity.

"Isn't this wonderful," Winston said. "Welcome to the world of nut-case conspiracies."

"I do not appreciate being classified as a nut-case, Mr. Winston," Ilsa said. "The evidence is quite clear if one opens one's eyes to it."

"Sorry, Mrs. Pucci, I didn't mean to insult you. It's just that, if there really was a plot, why hasn't someone blabbed by now - a death bed confession or one of those 'tell all' books?"

Seeing Ilsa draw breath to fire off an answering salvo, Chance spoke first. "How did you remember Cliff Hall's name, Winston?"

"I used to be a cop, remember?" He leaned back in his chair, making it groan. "Besides, I got a cousin who was Secret Service. One of the first black agents. He wasn't on the Kennedy detail, he was a field agent. But they were so short-handed for the Dallas visit, he got called up. He met all the heavy hitters. He told me even though Hall was assigned to Mrs. Kennedy, it damn near killed him when the president was shot. He felt like he failed."

There was a long silence. Then the door buzzer sounded. Once again Chance saw Julia Hasting's image in the security monitor. She carried two huge boxes bearing Pizza Hut labels. No sign of Cedric that he could see. Good.

"I'll go let her in," Guerrero said, getting to his feet with a look of grim anticipation etched on his features.

"Must be hungry," Winston said and winked at Chance.

Chance hoped Julia had a 'save my ass' spell all ready to go.

"…so what I need to know," Guerrero said as the elevator door opened a few minutes later, "is what you downloaded to our computer."

His utter lack of rancor made Chance sit up straight in his chair. Guerrero appeared to have completely forgotten his pique. He all but tugged Julia along by her elbow as he ushered her to the conference room.

"Wha'd she do to him?" Winston stage-whispered. "When he left he was ready to rip her fingernails out one-by-one."

Chance shrugged. "Her save-my-ass spell must've worked."

"Her _what_?"

Julia deposited the pizzas on the conference table and blew Chance a kiss. "Go ahead and eat while it's hot," she said. "We'll just be a minute."

"It's called CrossTalk," Julia told Guerrero. "with the correct incantation, you can collect information from several neighboring universes. But it shouldn't act like this. Let me see what's going on…."

With Guerrero peering over her shoulder, she pressed a few keys. "Oh, here's the problem." She pressed a few more keys and the Windows start-up screen appeared. "I'll give you the code to deactivate the program when you don't need it." She whispered it, then added, "Remember, always cross your left index finger over the middle finger before pressing ESCAPE. To bring CrossTalk back, you cross them the opposite way and reverse the code. Got it, Sweetling?"

A dropped pin would have clanged like a gong as Guerrero's gaze swept the room, daring anyone to comment on what she called him. Then he smiled at Julia. "Got it."

As the team and Julia settled in to enjoy their pizza, Chance filled her in on what had transpired.

"I…kind of promised Jacqueline I'd help," he concluded.

"_Kind of_?" Julia echoed, looking very somber.

"Well, a little more than kind of."

She placed her half-eaten pizza slice on the paper plate in front of her. "Christopher Chance! You _promised _her, didn't you? Why did you do something so…so foolish?"

"He suffers from dissociative identity disorder," Winston said, wiping a bit of pizza sauce from the corner of his mouth. "When his Sir Galahad personality kicks in, common sense goes right out the window."

"Very funny." Chance gave Julia his most winning smile. "So, how 'bout it, Red? Can you take me there? To Dallas in 1963?"

"To prevent the assassination? That would alter history. It's forbidden." She gave him an as-you-well-know look.

"It worked for Wyatt Earp."

"That was a different set of circumstances. Saving Wyatt Earp was sanctioned before I contacted you."

"Sanctioned by whom?"

"Why, the Sisterhood, of course."

Then I need to contact the sisterhood. Suppose the assassination wasn't supposed to happen, and it did because we didn't act?"


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

San Francisco, California  
the present

The sun disappeared from view as if swallowed by a hungry giant as Guerrero's Eldo entered the Webster Street Tube linking Oakland to Alameda Island. Chance rode in the back with Julia. Winston rode shotgun. Two days had passed since Julia agreed to present Chance's request for a meeting to her coven. They were on their way to speak with a representative of the Sisterhood.

Chance hated the Webster Street Tube. The fluorescent light-lined tunnel was one of the few means of accessing Alameda Island by automobile. 4,500 feet long, built sometime in the 1960s, it lacked the elegant art deco entryway the parallel Posey Tube carrying traffic the opposite direction boasted. Its featureless concrete walls funneling traffic into the tube reminded him of a solitary confinement cell.

Supposedly, the two tunnels were earthquake proof. Chance tried not to envision tons and tons of water turning the tunnels into a death-trap if the walls crumbled anyhow.

Mainly to distract himself, he said, "So tell us more about this Endora we're going to meet. Does she have a last name?"

Julia gave him a look. "Most people do."

She had already explained Endora was the person upon whom the writers of the old television comedy _Bewitched_ had based the show's scheming mother-in-law. But without a surname to include, Guerrero's computer search had turned up nothing relevant.

Julia side-stepped the name issue, saying, "I suppose you could call her a…vice president. You have no idea how fortunate you are she agreed to see you at all, never mind at such short notice."

"And she decides if we can undertake this operation."

"Not exactly. She decides whether the endeavor merits being brought to the attention of those who would make that decision."

"Oh. A sort of mid-witch. As opposed to a sandwich - OW!" Chance rubbed his bicep where Julia had pinched him.

"That wasn't funny, Christopher. You better not say anything like that to her or you could spend the rest of your very short life catching flies with your tongue."

It seemed like forever before they saw blue sky again, but at last Guerrero guided the Eldo from the tunnel and followed Julia's directions to a cul-de-sac off Central Avenue.

"There's her house," Julia said, pointing. "The gray Queen Ann."

Guerrero pulled to the curb, killed the engine, and exited the car. He beat Chance to the rear passenger door by a good three seconds and handed Julia from the seat.

Chance gazed at the house as he followed Guerrero and Julia up the flagstone walk, Winston at his heels. Although somewhat smaller than its magnificent neighbors, Endora's home possessed the same intricate hand-crafted ornamentation. A miniature turret on the second floor boasted a - what else - witch's hat roof, topped by a Direct TV receiver disguised as a weathervane.

Technically a 'Painted Lady', it was anything but the multi color Victorian era mansion upon which the name was commonly bestowed. He'd never seen a Painted Lady with less colorful paint. Nevertheless, its elegant, understated pale gray and gold leaf color scheme made its brilliantly painted neighbors look garish.

To reach the stained glass double door entry, they passed beneath an enormous horseshoe arch with radiating spindles looking far too fragile to be carved from any kind of wood.

Maybe they were spun sugar, Chance mused, recalling the gingerbread house hidden somewhere in Golden Gate Park.

A uniformed maid answered the door-chimes. She showed them into an old fashioned parlor complete with lead crystal chandelier, delicate rosewood and brocade settee with matching chairs, and a ceiling-high pipe organ in one corner. A green flame burned in a fireplace made of carved white quartz veined with pure California gold.

"Please make yourselves comfortable," the maid said. "Endora will join you presently."

Julia claimed a chair, crossed her ankles and folded her hands in her lap. The men glanced uncomfortably around, seeking furniture sturdy enough to bear their weight.

"Don't worry," Julia said, "nothing will collapse. Even if it did, we'd just spell it back together."

They no more than got settled when Endora swept in. They swiftly got to their feet again. Julia stepped forward to make introductions.

Endora did indeed resemble the sit-com character named for her. Or more aptly, the actress who portrayed Endora, Agnes Moorhead. She had Moorhead's smoker-husky voice and regal bearing. Her flowing caftan in swirls of blue and silver might have come straight from the program's wardrobe department. The greatest difference was her hair, a midnight black with a single white strand winding through the elaborate braid coiled atop her head in a coronet.

"How do you do," Endora said as she shook hands with them. Chance thought it sounded more like an interrogation than a greeting.

He calculated she must be at least in her eighties, but gut instinct suggested she was far older. No one would guess it from her hands, skin as young-looking as a girl's, fingers supple as a Black Jack dealer's.

"Now then," said Endora as she took command of the room from a perch on the pipe organ's bench, "tell me what this is all about."

.**.. ... ... ... ...**

"You do realize," Endora drawled, her husky voice dripping undisguised scorn, "this is a fool's errand. When you intervened on Wyatt Earp's behalf, you corrected an imbalance requiring adjustment. Otherwise your attempt would have failed. The assassination of John F. Kennedy in this universe, tragic as it was, was meant to happen."

There was a long silence. Then, feeling a little like a schoolboy called upon to recite, Chance stood.

"Are you so certain of that? If Jacqueline Kennedy found a way to contact us, how can you be sure whatever guiding force you accept as All Powerful hasn't seen an opportunity to correct something that shouldn't have happened in the first place?"

"Oh, man," Winston said, "you spent too much time with those monks at Port Cartier."

Endora held up a silencing hand. "No, I believe Mr. Chance has a valid point. It is very strange that Mrs. Kennedy was able to reach you, even assuming Nikola Tesla did create such a device as she apparently discovered."

The elder witch sat in silence for a time, eyes closed, lips pursed. Chance felt an itch developing on his left buttock and wanted desperately to scratch it. He knew if he did, she'd _know_.

"At the very least," Endora said at last, "I believe we need to ascertain how she managed to contact you. But before I can agree to help you with anything, I must consult with my…sorority." She hesitated over the word, as if finding the term as yet too new for her to speak it as nonchalantly as she would 'coven'. "I will do that, and inform you of their decision." She stood. "Gentlemen, I believe we are through for now."

They stood and the maid appeared to escort them to the door.

* * *

Three days later, Chance answered the office phone.

"It's me," Julia said, sounding bubbly and excited. "Endora asked me to call. She wants us all at her residence tonight. Ten PM sharp. I wouldn't be late if I were you."

"Wanna come over tonight and make sure I leave on time?" Chance asked, picturing Julia in her slinky black negligee. "Say seven o'clock?" First a leisurely dinner, then maybe an hour or two left over to…enjoy each other's company. "I'll chill some champagne and-"

"If I do, we'll both be late getting there. That would be a very…uncomfortable situation."

"Tell you what. I'll set a reminder on my cell-"

_Click_. He was talking to a dial tone.

"Red, you are one stubborn woman!"

A little before ten PM, Chance, Winston and Guerrero arrived at Endora's gilt and gray mansion. Chance could scarcely believe it was the same house. Lighted from within, exquisite stained glass windows, all but invisible in daylight, glowed like a frozen sunset. The golden trim sparkled with reflected color. He stole a second glance at the roof to see if the shingles had turned into Necco wafers or ginger pastilles.

A black and silver Harley Davidson motorcycle was parked at the curb. Guerrero passed by with a somewhat condescending glance - it wasn't an Eldo, after all. As Chance and Winston walked past, it produced a resounding back-fire.

"What the hell!" Winston shouted, flinging himself backward.

Chance leaped the curb, his head snapping left then right, his hand snatching for his pistol. Then he heard Julia.

"Cedric! Shame on you! Don't you do that again!" She stood beneath the horseshoe arch, shaking an admonishing finger at the now aphonic Harley. Beside her, Guerrero struggled to maintain a straight face.

"I might have known," Chance muttered. Then he uttered a low whistle as he took in Julia's body-hugging black leather riding garb.

"Come along, you guys," Julia said. "Endora doesn't like to be kept waiting."

As before, a uniformed maid ushered them into the sitting room. Soon Endora joined them, this time clad in poppy red. She waived for the men to sit, but remained standing herself.

"I have consulted with my coven. We have ascertained there are vital circumstances of which you are unaware. Before we can proceed, I must have your most sacred oaths to protect the secrecy of what I am about to reveal." She gave them an arch look. "Not that anyone would believe you if you told."

After a moment, Chance said, "It's policy to keep all our clients' information confidential."

Endora snorted. "We are hardly on a par with your everyday clients. Our secrets are valuable far beyond some mere mortal's Swiss bank account number. We have labored many decades to project the image of a few eccentric souls who practice nude midnight revelries but are otherwise harmless. If our true powers were discovered, we would be hunted down and tortured for our knowledge. We survived one Inquisition. I doubt we would fare as well in this modern age.

"If you desire our cooperation, you must swear never to reveal what our assistance was, nor from whence it came. Do I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly," Chance said. He stood and placed his hand over his heart. "I do solemnly swear to protect the secrets of the Sisterhood. If necessary, with my life."

"That will do nicely. So say you all?"

Winston, and after a moment's hesitation, Guerrero, stood also. "I do," each said.

Chance felt a sharp pressure change in his ears, as if flying an airplane that suddenly lost a thousand feet of altitude. Guerrero and Winston stared at him. They'd felt 'it', whatever 'it' was, too. Something had taken notice of their replies and deemed their words an unbreakable vow.

Endora rang a small bronze bell on a nearby side table. As if waiting in the hallway, the maid appeared with a tray holding a silver coffee service, thick ceramic mugs, and a plate piled high with chocolate chip cookies. "Please help yourselves," Endora said. "This may take a while."

With the air of a master storyteller getting good and comfortable, she settled into a wideseat armchair upholstered in chocolate and gold brocade.

"Now, then. My story begins in 1917 when Rose Kennedy gave birth to a son, a weak and fragile infant not expected to live. He was named John Fitzgerald. At the same time, somewhere on the California coastline, a Nereid captured and seduced by Joe Kennedy, Senior, was birthing her own child, a red-faced and squalling halfling she named Jack…."

**... ... ... ... ...**

"Let me get this straight," Winston said when Endora concluded her narrative. "Shortly after their birth, the babies were switched. The…halfling Jack grew up to be president John F. Kennedy? No way, no how, did that ever happen."

"Are you suggesting," Endora said, "that I have been untruthful?"

Her icy tone made Chance fear for Winston's continued existence as a two-legged being.

"Oh, no Ma'am. Not at all." Winston gave her his politician's grin, then his pissed-off cop's scowl. "I'm sayin' whoever fed you that story is full of bull."

Endora smiled in return. It was not a pleasant smile. Chance held his breath and waited for Winston to poof into a toad.

"What say you, Mr. Chance?"

Diplomacy, he thought. Tact. Charm. Crossed fingers. He swallowed.

"I'd say it does sound pretty far-fetched. But so do the concepts of time travel and parallel universes…." He shrugged. "It is kinda hard to believe the 35th president was…found in a cabbage patch."

At this, he had to strangle an overwhelming urge to let loose a full-blown belly laugh.

"Actually, it was a tide pool along the shoreline at Point Mugu," Endora said. She pointed a finger at the cookie plate. A cookie rose and glided into her outstretched hand.

At this, Winston's eyes bulged, but his voice remained steady as he said, "Wait a minute. What in hell is a neery-id, anyway?"

"Julia," Endora said, "our friend seems rather unfamiliar with the lore of the Sidhe. Would you kindly give him the Condensed Book version?"

"Yes, of course. Mr. Winston, the Sidhe, or the fairy folk as you probably learned to call them as a child, consist of a vast assortment of magical beings. The world of the Fae, which includes Nereids, is divided into two realms. They are the Seelie, commonly considered the 'good' fairies, and the Unseelie, the 'dark' fairies who delight in causing mischief.

"The Nereids are sea nymphs, not to be confused with Selkies or Sirens. They're Greek in origin, offspring of the Titan Nereus, and were highly prized as brides. They were married off to such notables as Poseidon and the Cyclops Polyphemus. Their descendants migrated over the centuries, some finding their way to Ireland where they sought sanctuary with Queen Mab - queen of the Unseelie - when the increased use of iron in shipbuilding threatened to poison them all. A few followed lovers to the New World, but they remain allied with the Unseelie Court."

"Oh, I get it. Kinda like Santa and his elves."

Julia gave Winston the smile of a teacher whose dullest student had just solved the riddle of the Sphinx. "Exactly!"

"Endora," Chance said, "If the babies were switched and Rose Kennedy raised the halfling, what became of the genuine JFK, the boy Rose gave birth to?"

"An astute question, Mr. Chance. According to folklore, when a human infant was exchanged for a Fae child, the Fae mother took the human child to raise as her own. But the Nereid whose baby replaced Rose's son had no way to care for a full-blood human, especially an ailing one. She probably drowned it."

For a long moment, the only sound in the room was the indifferent tick of the humpback clock on the mantelpiece.

"So all this makes it okay to assassinate Kennedy?" Guerrero said, startling them all with his vehemence. "What does his biology matter? His history, his track record is what counts, whether he was Rose Kennedy's son or someone else's."

"Or some_thing_ else's," Winston muttered.

"Not…okay," Endora said. "But that brings me to the matter I called you here to discuss. My sisterhood has examined other universes where Kennedy did not die in Dallas. In some instances, Lee Harvey Oswald missed completely. In most, however, Kennedy was shot but not killed. Rather, he suffered brain damage which in turn either incapacitated him, or severely altered his personality."

She paused to sip her coffee.

"In the worlds where his personality altered, he became a power-hungry warmonger who sought world domination through whatever means necessary. We believe, Mr. Guerrero, this is due in part to his genetic makeup. Among the Unseelie a thirst for blood is not uncommon.

"For the most part, he was removed from office before he created world chaos. In some instances, however, his intentions were not discovered until it was too late. From omens we observed, this world is one which would have suffered apocalyptic damage, had Kennedy survived."

"You said sometimes Oswald missed," Winston said. "If you can send Chance back in time, why can't he eliminate Oswald from the equation altogether? No Oswald, no bad shot, no brain damage, no personality change. No apocalypse."

"If only it were that simple. However, neutralizing Oswald after so much time has passed would unquestionably result in a …traumatic restructuring of this world as we know it." She looked straight at Chance. "Oswald must be allowed to make his attempt. That is not all. In the universes we studied, whether the Dallas attempt is successful hinges on whether Oswald is or is not the lone gunman. Where he succeeds, he has help."

Guerrero leaped to his feet. "Are you saying we're supposed to _help_ that little turd?"

"Please sit down, Mr. Guerrero. Let me finish. Since our Kennedy did die, Oswald must have had help. The other shooters were never captured. Never identified. And yet witness after witness saw things happen that never appear in the Warren Report. Things that must happen to insure this world does not deviate from its intended path. I am saying it is most probable your team is the catalyst needed to insure what was meant to be, happens.

"To that end, Mr. Chance, my sisterhood will assist you."

Chance didn't know what to say. He hadn't bargained for any of this. When he promised Jacqueline Kennedy he'd try to help, he believed he might prevent an assassination that devastated an entire world. To accomplish the one thing that would give total absolution for his many crimes. Now, if Endora could be believed, he must not only not save Kennedy, he must take part in killing him.

"You can't do it, dude," Guerrero said. "You can't help them kill Kennedy."

"It's already done," Chance reminded him. "Whatever we decide, we've already done it."


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

San Francisco, California  
the present

In his dream, Chance was running.

Running hard on pavement so hot it burned through the soles of his shoes. Sunlight glared, all but blinding him. He missed again and again as he grabbed for the handholds mounted on the dark limousine. A woman drenched in blood reached toward him, her sleeves dragging through a red and gray slurry of blood and brain matter -

The pealing of his cell-phone jolted him from the ghastly scenario. He groped for the phone, almost dropping it. "Chance," he mumbled, heart still racing. If it was Ames - or God help him, Harry - pulling some prank he'd -

"This is Endora," the caller said. "I'm sorry to disturb you at this time of night."

He squinted at his nightstand clock's luminous dial. It was 'night' only because the sun did not shine at 3:08 in the morning.

"An important matter has come to my attention. Discussing it cannot wait. Are you awake, Mr. Chance?"

"Mostly. What's wrong, Endora?"

"My Sisterhood has discovered new specifics about the device Mrs. Kennedy used to contact you. We have determined it was constructed using knowledge that should not be available to mankind for another fifty years. Given certain government agencies' skill in performing reverse engineering, it is imperative the device be recovered. I have been instructed to convey to you the urgency of this matter. There must be no delay in bringing the device to us for safekeeping."

This was what couldn't wait until oh, say, nine AM or maybe ten o'clock?

"I can try…." But damned if he had any sudden brainstorms as to how.

Endora's voice took on a sultry purr more ominous than any tirade. "We expect you to do better than merely try, Mr. Chance. Failure would prove…disadvantageous for all concerned."

Chance sat up, all at once wide awake.. "Endora, are you threatening me?"

"Oh, I truly hope it doesn't come to that. Good night, Mr. Chance. Pleasant dreams..."

**... ... ... ... ...**

Chance was working on his third cup of coffee, gazing unseeing at a bowl on the table filled with oranges, apples and grapes when Julia poked her head into the staff lounge.

"There you are," she said as if she'd just discovered his all time best hiding place. "Endora asked me to let you know she has arranged for the Arlington Coven to work with us. They'll provide a place to stay, period clothing, anything else you think you might need to recover the device."

Chance started to ask how she'd gotten into the building, then decided he really didn't want to know. He was still pissed at Endora. The pleasant dreams she had wished him were anything but.

Winston entered the lounge and gave Julia a sunny smile. "Hey, Julia, have a seat. Did Mr. Manners here offer you something to drink?" He reached for a coffee mug.

"I'd love a cup of tea, if you have any."

"Me, too," said Guerrero from behind Winston. "I'll make it."

Despite his sour mood, Chance got down to business.

"We need a means to communicate," he said. "Something that will work with 1960s technology. That was a big problem in Tombstone." He fixed Julia with a penetrating stare. "If you could have told me you were going off with Josie, I would have warned you not to."

"If Josie hadn't made herself look just like Bessie Earp, I wouldn't have needed any warning, thank you very much! Besides, thanks to Cedric, you found me."

"Yeah, well, we can't have a horse traipsing all over Washington looking for you if you disappear again."

"I won't disappear. Honestly, Christopher, do you think I just fell off my first broom yesterday?"

"Winston," Chance said, "what sort of radio did your cousin the Secret Service agent use? Nothing like our satellite link-up existed in those days."

Winston glanced up from the orange he was carving the peel from in a single fragrant strand. "I think they used Motorola walkie-talkies. Problem was, anyone who knew the frequency could listen in. And they were big. Heavy. Hard to hide."

"Walkie-talkies would work if we used a frequency the G-men didn't. But I want something small and easily concealed. Any ideas? Guerrero?"

Guerrero carried two steaming mugs to the table. He placed one in front of Julia.

"I know a guy who collects antique telecommunication equipment. He owes me." Guerrero reached for his cell phone.

"How do you intend to make contact with Jackie Kennedy?" Julia asked. "You can't just walk up to the front door of the White House and ask to see her."

Even before Endora's telephone call, Chance had given some thought to this matter. The chance of a casual tourist encountering the president on the White House grounds, shaking hands, and offering a word of advice on how to run the country ended when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. By the Kennedy era, hefty security measures were in place to insure the First Family's safety and privacy. Chance considered taking a White House tour and getting 'lost' or asking the Arlington Coven to arrange an interview with Jacqueline, but he thought he knew a better way.

The White House internal telephone system was an enormous switchboard dating from before World War Two. Operators wearing cumbersome headsets answered calls by plugging a cord into the jack below a color-coded light the size of a large pea.

Someone with the proper knowledge and equipment could route a call through the switchboard by tapping into the mainframe.

"Simple," Chance said. "I'll call her and ask her to meet me."

The following day, a package arrived. It contained four three-ounce transmitters with lead-wires connected to receivers looking like old-fashioned hearing aids.

"They'll bounce signals off the old Telstar satellite the telephone companies used," Guerrero said as he examined one of the transmitters.. "Looks like they've been modified to block monitoring by any 1960s technology. Problem is, only two people can talk at one time."

"We can work with that," Chance said. He noticed Guerrero held a roll of white surgical tape. "What's that for?"

"These transmitters are pretty fragile. You don't want to drop it or have it fall out of a pocket. So…you…."

"Oh, hell. Tape it to my chest."

* * *

Linthicum Heights, Maryland  
the present

Ilsa's jet touched down at Baltimore Washington International Airport well after dark. Although the airport was some thirty miles distant from Washington, D.C., it was only a short drive to the Linthicum Heights residence of Kassandra Parker, a member of the Sisterhood who had offered the use of her guest cottage and her magic.

As it did when they made their flight from San Francisco to Tucson before time-hopping to 1881 Tombstone, Cedric traveled disguised as a bass violin. Chance grunted as he heaved the heavy case onto the luggage cart. Like a cat that resented being held, the damned broom seemed to grow heavier each time Chance lifted it.

When they reached Executive Parking, Chance looked in vain for a vehicle towing a horse trailer. "Where's our transportation?" he asked.

Julia pointed at a tiny Smart Car in the darkest corner of the lot. Hitched to it was a cart resembling a length of down-spout cut in half, with two tires attached.

"You don't think Cedric's gonna ride on _that,_ do you?"

Chance wasn't fond of the broom, but after Cedric's assistance solving a small but critical problem during their time in Tombstone, he didn't want it suffering any unnecessary discomfort.

"Of course he will."

Maybe if they left him in the case and strapped it down good and snug….

"Let's let him out and see how he likes it."

Nope. Not leaving him in the case. This, Chance thought, better be good.

They placed Cedric gently on the pavement. Chance promptly removed himself from the possible proximity of a flying hoof. But rather than its equine persona, Cedric morphed into the sleek Harley Davidson that had back-fired at him in front of Endora's residence.

Chance felt a little dense for not recognizing the motorcycle trailer for what it was.

"Cedric draws too much attention in his equine form," Julia said. "This is horse country. People always want to know his bloodlines. Of course I can't tell anyone I captured him wild and don't know anything about his sire and dam. So I have to make up a fib, and that makes him grumpy. Kassandra has a huge back yard where no one will notice him. He'll go equine there."

"Wait. You captured him - it - wild? As in out West, running with wild mustangs?"

"Well, I suppose you could say that, although it wasn't out West at all, it was in Faerie. And no easy task, I kid you not. Witches aren't welcome there. Especially when we come to capture a broom. Can you push him up the ramp, or shall I start him up?"

With the Cedric-cycle strapped to the cart, they headed for Bluefeather, Kassandra Parker's estate.

Standing three stories high, Bluefeather reposed on a spacious parcel of land a short distance from historic Turkey Hill, birthplace of Congressman John Charles Linthicum. Linthicum had sponsored the legislation establishing "The Star Spangled Banner" as America's National Anthem. Chance followed a curving drive to the rear of the sprawling fieldstone structure. Yard lights came on as he parked the Smart Car beside the estate's barn.

If he hadn't know Mae West died some time around 1980, he would have sworn it was the voluptuous blonde actress from the 1930s herself who came slinking out to greet them.

She wore a mink-trimmed peignoir and high-heeled mules. Her platinum blonde hair was marcelled in place with hot irons. Like Mae West, she stood only about five-two, but her mules added another three inches. She carried a spiraled wooden rod tipped with a crystal glowing a faint luminous green.

She gave her rod the same nonchalant twirl a flapper might her overlong string of pearls. "So ya fin'ly got here. Took ya long enough. Yer lookin' good, Julia, but the fox ya got wit'ya looks even better. Mmmmm. Why'n'cha introduce us?"

Julia performed a curtsy Chance had never seen her do before.

"Mistress Kassandra Parker, may I present Mr. Christopher Chance."

Recalling the deference shown Princess Victoria's mother, Chance made a respectful bow. "It's an honor, Mistress Parker."

"Mmmm. I like that. He's got manners. Call me Kassandra, honey. Ya make me feel old. Lissen, I'd love ta stay'n chat, but it's almost midnight an' I got a hot date waitin'." She rolled her eyes, as if anticipating something delightfully wicked. "Go get yerselves settled in the guest house. There's dinner in the 'fridge ya can re-heat if yer hungry. I'll see ya in the morning for breakfast. Seven o'clock and don't be late."

Kassandra pivoted and swivel-hipped her way to the door. When she opened it, the inside lighting silhouetted her hourglass figure through the wispy peignoir.

Julia breathed a huge sigh. "Thank the goddess you made a good impression," she said. "Otherwise, things could be sticky. Um…if she invites you to see her etchings…it might be a good idea to find a chaperone."

Chance still stood staring, bemused, at the doorway through which Kassandra had disappeared. It took a sharp jab from Julia's elbow to refocus his attention.

"Why do we call her 'Mistress'?" he asked as he helped unbuckle the straps securing the Cedric-cycle to the trailer. Although Kassandra hadn't dressed the part, the word _dominatrix_ came to mind.

"Because she is the high priestess of the East Coast Bailiwick. All thirteen covens." Julia lowered her voice. "She even outranks Endora."

So don't piss her off, was Julia's unspoken warning.

They off-loaded Cedric, who instantly morphed into his equine form and raced off, hooves thundering. Chance carried their overnight bags into the guest cottage, the former carriage house.

In the morning over breakfast, Chance gave Kassandra a list of the items he expected to need.

"Nothin' here we can't provide," Mistress Kassandra said, perusing the list. "Now, the way it'll work, Julia transports ya to the correct year using her broom. You'll make the transition in my back yard. Everything'll be set - your equipment and transportation will be waiting. When you've acquired the device, you'll return here to transition to the present. Any questions?"

"Won't we disturb the people who lived here in 1963?" Chance asked.

"Honey, I _am_ the people who lived here in 1963. I'll be expectin' ya."


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER FOUR

Linthicum Heights, MD  
November, 1963

One of the best things about riding Cedric in his motorcycle form, Chance mused as they sped along the freeway two days later, was the excuse it gave him to wrap his arms around Julia's waist and snuggle close, his chest against her spine.

Much as he enjoyed the wind whipping through his hair, riding minus a helmet was another matter. In the 1960's helmets were for sissies. If they crashed and his skull cracked like Humpty Dumpty's shell, maybe the Sisterhood could spell it together again, but he really didn't want to undergo the experience to find out. He cringed as a huge 18-wheeler hauling a load of used tires screamed past, twin CB antennas swaying in the slip-stream.

The telephone company van he'd requested waited for them in a parking area at Overlook Park. Julia rolled the Cedric-cycle well into the trees and cast a quick 'ignore me' spell so it could morph into its equine form.

When Chance opened the van, a pale, translucent image of Julia drifted toward him. He jerked aside as the…thing…floated out the door. It grew more distinct as it neared Julia and Cedric. Watching Julia speak to her own ghostly image made his skin crawl.

"What the hell is that thing?" he asked as Julia joined him at the van.

"Oh, just a doppelganger. She won't bother anybody. Ready?"

Now Chance got it. A horse left alone in the park might attract unwanted attention. If a young woman lounged nearby, it was just another saddle horse munching grass.

They took the Beltway into downtown Washington, with Julia consulting a map to find the Capital grounds. Like Chance, she wore a General Telephone and Electric work coverall. She'd hidden her hair under a baseball cap. Her curvy figure didn't resemble any telephone lineman's physique Chance had ever seen, but with luck no one would pay much attention.

After a few wrong turns, they located utility pole #729, a pole artfully screened by evergreen trees planted for that very purpose. From it diverged the main trunklines to and from the White House. Given the antique technology of the 1960's, Chance had to manually tap into the telephone lines.

Julia set out orange traffic cones while Chance strapped on the lineman's gaffs workmen used to ascend the first ten or twelve feet of utility poles, which lacked low hand- and foot-hold brackets to discourage unauthorized climbing. Then, safety belt in place, he started up.

From a height roughly level with the White House third story roof, the view was spectacular. Less than a hundred years ago, peering through an upstairs window, President Abraham Lincoln would have seen Confederate flags flying on the far side of the Potomac River.

Now, snow from a recent storm splotched the White House grounds. In a sheltered corner, a snowman stood sentinel, a small American flag on a stick thrust through one arm. Here and there, brilliant crimson berries added splashes of color to the naked brown hedges and dark green firs. In the distance, the Washington Monument pointed a pristine white finger at the skies above the Land of the Free. Home of the brave. Killers of presidents.

The day before, he had pored over schematics of the switchboard wiring someone from the Sisterhood had provided, so he knew which cable to attach the old-fashioned handset with its rotary dial. Touch-tone phones were the newest thing, but linemen's handsets retained rotary dials for several years to come.

He completed the tap, sent a pulse down the wire, and in a moment a sharp "click!" indicated a switchboard operator, probably senior operator Mary, had spotted the red light on the board signaling someone in the Oval Office had picked up the phone.

Mimicking the Boston accent that made Kennedy so easy to impersonate, Chance said, "Mary? Find Mrs. Kennedy for me. I'll hold."

"Certainly, Mr. President. I believe I know right where she is."

The purr of a distant extension sounded twice before a soft feminine voice answered, "Hello?"

Chance waited until he heard the distinct sound of the operator closing the key that removed her from the connection.

"Mrs. Kennedy," he said in his own voice, "this is Christopher Chance. Be careful how you answer if there's anyone else in the room."

After a moment, Jacqueline said, "I'm alone except for the children. How ever did you persuade the switchboard to put your call through?"

"By, umm, imitating your husband," he said in JFK's voice, and heard her soft, stifled laugh. "I need to speak with you in private," he continued. "Is there some place we can meet?"

**… … … … …**

Once he assured her he could elude White House security, Jacqueline told him to wait for her among the trees bordering the tennis courts.

"We're good to go," he told Julia when he climbed down the pole. He unstrapped the gaffs and stowed them in the van. After a moment, he removed his pistol and holster, and slid them under the seat. Getting caught sneaking onto the White House grounds with a gun would cause incalculable complications.

"Try to keep out of sight. I'll make this as short as I can. If something happens or you need me, press the transmit button three times."

The transmitters were supposed to be snoop-proof, but he saw no reason to risk someone overhearing even an innocuous broadcast. Three clicks weren't easily traced, or sent by accident. He had the device taped to his chest, its receiver in one ear. The tape itched. He wondered where Julia had secured her transmitter.

"I remember. Now _you_ remember," Julia said. "This 'ignore me' spell holds only as long as you say nothing. Utter one word, sneeze, even, and the spell pops like a bubble."

"So why are we using…third rate magic spells when there must be stronger enchantments. Why not make me invisible?"

Julia's hands went to her hips. "Excuse me! This happens to be a top-of-the-line enchantment! The problem is, you're a mortal. I can only do so much. Now keep quiet - and stay quiet until you're ready to reveal yourself."

Chance had the distinct impression he'd just been insulted. From the way Julia's eyes twinkled, he suspected she was smothering a hoot of laughter as she recited the incantation.

Her 'ignore me' spell worked - he suppressed a grin - like a charm.

Wearing his General Telephone coverall and jacket, carrying his toolbox, he strolled past the main sentry station unchallenged. In the 21st century, motion and pressure sensors would perceive any anomaly on the White House grounds, alert snipers on the roof, and scramble the Secret Service Uniformed Division with their K-9 partners. Spell or no spell, dogs would detect him with a single sniff. The Kennedy White House possessed no sophisticated perimeter alarms, no roof-top snipers. Chance made his way to the tennis courts unnoticed.

Jacqueline, however, had to elude her Secret Service watchdogs without the assistance of magic. While the agents never trespassed into the presidential living quarters, the moment any members of the First Family stepped foot below the second floor, they acquired an escort.

But Jacqueline was not without her wiles. Soon, dressed in a borrowed maid's uniform and winter coat, a woolen cap covering her hair, the First Lady was stealthily descending a secret staircase reached through the master bedroom. Concealed beneath a stack of towels was the mysterious device Chance had asked her to bring. Minutes later, she exited an all-but-invisible door onto the South Lawn. Keeping to the trees, she headed for the tennis courts.

It was cold beneath the snow-laden evergreen branches. Snow lingered wherever the sun's feeble winter rays failed to penetrate. Chance paced to keep warm. From time to time, branches shifted, dropping their frosty burden to the ground, or, when timing and location converged, down the back of Chance's neck.

He couldn't even cuss the icy whiteness. The 'ignore me' spell would break the moment he spoke. The last thing he needed was for White House security to stumble across an unauthorized telephone repairman lurking on the grounds. Or a housemaid to wander outside for a smoke and spot him. Or for one of the free-roaming geese to sense his presence.

He froze. Geese were as vigilant as German Shepherds when it came to safeguarding their territory. Here one came right now, waddling across the South Lawn, headed directly for the tennis courts. Just great.

Intent on the goose, Chance realized he'd been hearing the slow, soft thud of approaching hooves an instant before a whickered greeting exploded from an equine nose.

Reflex launched him into a combat crouch, grabbing for his not-there pistol even as he realized a goddammed _horse_ had sneaked up on him. Heart racing, he eased upright.

"Cedric! Dammit, what are you - "

It wasn't Cedric.

It was much smaller, and not a dapple gray. Chance didn't know what color to call the white-spotted brown pony with its scruffy black mane and tail, but he knew its name."

"Macaroni!"

Macaroni whickered again and thrust his nose at Chance's hand, seeking a treat.

"Sorry, little guy. I don't have a thing."

He was scratching the pony behind its ears when a soft voice behind him spoke.

"Mr. Chance? I see you've met Caroline's pony. Is he making a nuisance of himself?"

**… … … … …**

"I'm so thankful you're here," Jacqueline said. "John will start his re-election campaign at the end of this month. His protection detail do their best, but I'm sure you've seen how he is when there's a crowd. He simply wades right in, and I'm so afraid someone will try to kill him. I'm not supposed to know about the threats, but I do."

This was the moment Chance dreaded. The moment he had to lie to Jacqueline Kennedy.

"I believe we can keep the president safe from harm, and at the same time expose the person or persons plotting against him."

"Just keep him safe until after the election," Jacqueline said. "He has plans, very important plans. Once he reveals what he intends to do, no one will dare harm him. Imagine, Mr. Chance, a world where all children can grow up free. Free from fear, free from hunger. Free from prejudices. If he's re-elected, that will happen. In our lifetime."

Her eyes sparkled with hope and exuberance. "We'll have you to thank Mr. Chance."

Chance felt sick to his stomach. Not since the night he failed to save Diana, Princess of Wales, had he felt more helpless. He hated what he had to do, hated deceiving Jacqueline. Hated giving her hope when the situation was beyond hopeless.

"Let's be certain nothing goes wrong before you hand me any medals," he said. "Um, Mrs. Kennedy, could I have a look at that device you used to contact me?"

The moment he saw it, he knew it was something Tesla invented. With no power cord and no battery compartment, it looked like it wasn't good for anything but a door-stop, but Chance felt a faint vibration coming from it as it drew energy from the earth itself.

"Where'd you find it?" he asked, wondering if other forbidden devices were hidden like preternatural Easter eggs throughout the labyrinth within and beneath the White House.

"Caroline found it," Jacqueline said. "She's never been able to explain precisely where. She wandered away from Nanny Shaw one afternoon. As you can imagine, it gave us a terrible fright. When we found her, she was in the schoolroom, playing with it. Pretending it was 'Captain Kirk's tricorder'. She's quite the little Trekkie, you know."

"Is that so?" Chance had watched a few old Star Trek re-runs as a kid. He looked at the object again. It did somewhat resemble the recording device landing parties from the _Enterprise _carried.

"She told us she talked to Lt. Uhura on it," Jacqueline added with a doting smile. "I suppose she somehow contacted one of our WACs somewhere, who was kind enough to indulge a little girl."

Chance wasn't so sure. He felt the nape of his neck prickle as he considered who, given the object's arcane origins, Caroline might really have spoken with.

"To be honest," Jacqueline continued, "I was quite surprised when you answered. Caroline said all you do is turn the dials and say the name of the person with whom you wish to speak. When I couldn't contact you through…conventional means, I decided to try this. I had nothing to lose if it failed. Or perhaps I should say everything to lose unless you did respond."

"I'll do whatever I can, Mrs. Kennedy." Which was nothing. Absolutely nothing. "Um…about this device. I'm confident Nicola Tesla designed it. I'd like to take it with me. See if my team can reproduce it. It's more powerful than our own radio-phones. And not as vulnerable to eavesdroppers."

"But what if I need to reach you again?"

He produced a business card. "Here's a telephone number you can use." It dialed into an answering service one of the Sisterhood maintained. "It's a secure line so you can speak freely. Make sure you're not overheard. It's better if no one knows you've brought in a…secret weapon."

"I understand. Then yes, take it. But about Tesla - wasn't he some sort of mad scientist? A…kook as the youngsters say?"

"He was a genius," Chance said. "As far ahead of his time as the atomic age is beyond steam."

Jacqueline Kennedy gave him her most brilliant smile. "Exactly like my husband."

**... ... ... ... ...**

With the 'ignore me' spell dissipated, Chance had to leave the grounds without attracting attention. Keeping deep in the trees, he removed the General Telephone coveralls and tucked them into his tool box.

The General Telephone jacket reversed to display an L.A. Dodgers emblem embroidered on the back. Chance tucked the Tesla device inside it, zipped it up, and tugged on a Dodgers baseball cap. Even on vacation, men did not go hatless in the 1960s.

He lingered in the trees until the next camera-laden tour group emerged from the White House, chattering and waving to their guide. Leaving the toolbox for the Sisterhood to recover, Chance sauntered over to join them. No one paid any attention to people exiting the White House grounds.

Jacqueline Kennedy's face haunted him. What would it be like, he wondered, to be loved by someone as deeply as Jackie loved JFK. To have a woman so enamored she overlooked the egregious insult her psyche endured each time he bedded another woman. Men and women might not view infidelity in the same way, but didn't a vow - to love, honor cherish - mean anything?

He had experienced a small measure of that adoration with Maria, although their relationship was far too volatile to ever mature into the special bond he sometimes saw with couples who lived only to make each other happy. Who never saw the other's thinning hair or thickening middle. What Katherine might have felt for him and he for her they never had an opportunity to explore, but more than once he'd caught her looking at him in a way that made him feel like the luckiest man alive.

Jacque line's eyes glowed when she spoke of her husband.

Soon that glow would be extinguished forever.

And I, Chance thought sadly, will be the man who puts it out.

**... ... ... ... ...**

When he reached the telephone company van, Julia was nowhere in sight.

"Not again," he muttered. "Dammit, you were supposed to wait here."

He stowed the Tesla device inside the van, then put away the traffic cones. She still hadn't returned. Chance decided to risk calling her. If he had to wear something taped to his chest, he might as well use it. He climbed into the van and pressed the transmit button on the transceiver.

"Julia, where are you?"

No reply. He wouldn't have missed the three-click distress signal, so he felt sure she wasn't in trouble. So where was she - shopping? _Damn it Julia!_

After a minute he tried again.

This time a breathless Julia answered. "I'm almost there! I just have to - shoo! Shoo, goose! Go awa - " The transmission abruptly cut off.

Chance smirked as he pictured Julia fending off an aggravated goose. _That'll teach you to go exploring._

His amusement fizzled when he realized if a goose was chasing her, she must have sneaked onto the White House grounds. Just great. If anyone saw her….

A moment later, she hopped into the van and slammed the door. "Whew!"

"What were you up to?" he demanded, starting the engine. "You were supposed to stay out of sight."

"I had something I needed to do. Don't worry, no one saw me."

Listening for pursuing sirens, Chance pulled away from the curb. "No one saw you doing what?"

"If you must know, I needed to speak with Abraham Lincoln." She shifted in her seat to face him. "Guess what he told me?"

"_Abraham Lincoln_? What did you do, sneak back in time while I was talking to Jacqueline?"

"Of course not, silly. How could I without Cedric? No, I just cast my own 'ignore me' spell and went looking for him. We had a very interesting chat. Guess what? He told me the man we all think is JFK, isn't."

"Abraham Lincoln told you JFK isn't JFK."

"Well, I know we already thought so, but now we have proof. Why are you looking so skeptical? If anyone knows what's going on in the White House, it's Abe Lincoln. He's haunted it for almost a century."

It's a good thing I need both hands on the wheel in this traffic, Chance thought, or I'd grab you and shake her 'til your teeth rattle! "You were talking to Abraham Lincoln's ghost."

"Yes! And he believes the substitution took place sometime during the trip JFK made to Germany - probably when he stopped in Ireland. He came back changed somehow. Mr. Lincoln has puzzled over it ever since."

"So your 'proof' is something a ghost told you?"

"Oh, well, call it corroboration, then. What's wrong with that? Honest Abe never told a lie, and neither would his ghost!"

Julia folded her arms across her chest and looked annoyed all the way back to Overlook Park.


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

San Francisco, California  
the present

With the Tesla device delivered to the Sisterhood, Chance directed his attention toward dealing with Dallas. He knew he couldn't handle the operation on his own. He needed Winston and Guerrero's help.

Chance glanced up from the web-page showing a detailed drawing of Dealey Plaza as Winston strode into his office. "Lemme show you something," Winston said, all but elbowing Chance to one side in his haste to reach the computer.

He pressed keys and in a moment the screen displayed a U.S. Army records fingerprint card overstamped with the phrase _National Archives_. The name Kennedy, John Fitzgerald was typed across the top, and the date 18 July, 1941.

Winston pressed more keys. A second page opened, displaying a second fingerprint card, this one with the imprint of Parkland Memorial Hospital. Unsteady fingers had printed the name John F. Kennedy and the date 11-22-63.

He pressed more keys and the cards displayed side-by-side.

"Notice anything?" Winston asked.

"Off the top of my head, I'd say the first set's for some soldier who got ragged a lot because of his name. JFK was Navy, not Army."

"JFK tried to enlist in the Army before settling for the navy. Army wouldn't take him because of his back. Lots-a people don't remember that. If there's any official document connected to Kennedy that hasn't been tampered with, this is it. Now look at those two cards _real_ close."

Chance gazed at the cards, unable to detect anything unusual. Finally he shook his head. "Okay, what am I missing?"

"They're damn near identical."

"So? Shouldn't they be?"

"So, think! They should _be _identical, not _damn near _identical."

Chance straightened and concentrated on the cards. Winston pressed more keys and tiny red stars appeared everywhere discrepancies occurred.

"Damn," Chance breathed, looking at Winston, then at the screen. "A twin? Or a clone? Was anyone able to clone a human being in the 1960s?" Another Tesla? One whose genius was directed against humanity, backed by some scheming megalomaniac- -

"Get real. No twin. No clone, and damn sure no half-fairy substitute for Rose Kennedy's baby boy who'd grow up some day to be president, either. Endora's a real nice lady, but if she believes that bullshit, she's crazy."

And so are you, Winston's look implied.

"All the same," he continued, "there's something fishy going on. The army card came straight from the National Archives. The other one came directly from the body brought into Parkland Hospital. Both cards are legit. We've got two different people."

"Wait a minute, Winston. Remember Ilsa said the autopsy photos were tampered with? The X-rays, too. That card from Parkland was probably faked as well."

"Why? To give conspiracy nuts more ammunition? Nope. The Parkland print card is the real thing. My cousin took the impressions himself. Been locked away in his desk since 1963."

"That means the man shot in Dallas wasn't…."

"Wasn't the same man who tried to enlist in 1941."

"But if the Army prints are JFK's- - the one who grew up a Kennedy, and that JFK wasn't the man shot in Dallas- -what became of him? And who in hell's the substitute whose prints almost match, and looks enough like him to be his twin…my God, Winston, a Russian agent? A mole?"

"Makes sense. It might explain the personality changes attributed to brain damage some of the survivors exhibited. A mole doing what he was put in place to do."

"Kennedy seemed to be developing a certain rapport with Premier Khrushchev, if I remember my history class correctly."

"Yeah, right, the same guy who pounded his desk with his shoe and bragged 'We will bury you!' Just the guy you want to get friendly with."

"Keep your friends close, your enemies closer…." Chance murmured.

He pushed back his chair and stood. Excitement heated his voice. "Knowing Kennedy…wasn't Kennedy would explain a lot. Hell, Winston, it explains everything. Why the CIA and FBI needed to remove him. Why the Secret Service protection seemed so lax. They were all working together. They must have known he was an imposter. Why didn't Endora tell us that?"

"Maybe she didn't know."

"Don't you think Jackie would have known? Why wouldn't she scream bloody murder if she found a strange man in her bed? When I spoke to her, she sounded like a schoolgirl talking about her first crush."

"I…um…don't think they were sharing a bed then," Winston said.

"…Oh." Chance wasn't so sure. "Well, it still doesn't explain Oswald. If they needed to insure Kennedy's death, why didn't they use the best sniper available, not some screw-up who couldn't hold a job?"

"Maybe they tried to find one and couldn't. Would you have done it?"

Chance exhaled a deep breath. "There was a time when I did what I was told."

The men's gaze locked. Winston turned away from the pain he saw in Chance's eyes.

"My guess is," Winston said, "they knew what Oswald meant to do, and decided to let it happen. They made it as easy as possible for him and he still couldn't get the job done. It's why, where he did succeed, he had help."

"I think you're right. Not only that, I think his help…was us." Chance felt a sudden jolt of unreality as he pictured a hundred thousand universes with a hundred thousand duplicates of himself, all struggling to make sense of a massive dose of improbability.

He pressed a button on the intercom. "Hey, Guerrero, you busy? Come in here a minute."

Guerrero munched on an apple as he strolled into Chance's office. "What's up, dude?"

"Guerrero, do you remember Joubert's film of the Kennedy assassination? The one he liked to show recruits? Did he ever show it to you?"

"And give the 'if I'd trained those bozos' speech? Yeah, I saw it once, a long time ago. Why?"

"Remember the two men behind the stockade fence? Did you notice anything unusual about them?"

"Before or after they killed JFK?"

"No, think about it. Didn't they look sort of familiar? I'm pretty certain those two men- -the one in coveralls and the one in a suit- -were you and me."

"No way. There is no way anyone's getting me to help kill Kennedy."

"That's another thing," Winston said. "We've got documents proving Kennedy wasn't Kennedy."

**... ... ... ... ...**

Although Chance usually preferred not to follow a specific plan, he invited Julia to join Guerrero and Winston later that evening to discuss how he hoped to accomplish their mission. The Dallas coven, Julia told him, was standing by to assist whenever needed. The truly tricky part was persuading Winston and Guerrero to back his play. None of them had any stomach for this particular job.

Winston listened without speaking, shaking his head from time to time as Chance spoke. Then he brought up one critical issue still needing resolution.

"So…just how," he said to Julia, "will you transport all of us to 1963? It's okay for Chance here, even maybe Guerrero, to ride double with a witch, but that won't work for me. There is no way you're getting ME on a horse, much less one that turns into a…a flying broom."

"You're just afraid you'll fall off," Chance said, relieved to put the previous topic behind them.

"Or break the broom," Guerrero muttered.

Winston folded his arms across his chest and glowered.

"Endora will see to your transfer, Mr. Winston," Julia said. "Don't worry."

"On her _broom_?" he persisted, shaking his head no.

"Oh, no. Her broom is quite elderly. She mostly uses him for ceremonial purposes. Besides, Endora's a very up-to-date witch. She flies a- -"

"Vacuum cleaner?" Winston cut in. "Does she fly a vacuum cleaner? She does, doesn't she?" He gave a deep, sardonic chuckle.

Julia widened her eyes and stared at him in mock amazement. "Mr. Winston. You are so clever. How did you ever guess?"

After Julia left, Winston turned to Chance. "Is she for real? A _vacuum cleaner_?"

Chance gave Winston his most innocent look and shrugged. He wouldn't put anything past Endora. "I guess there's only one way to find out."

Convincing Guerrero proved far more difficult. It was as if he sensed Chance was concealing something, something he was not going to like. In the end, Chance concluded the only reason Guerrero agreed to come along was his hope of somehow stopping what seemed destined to occur. Whatever the man's reasons, Chance needed him.

He didn't know what Guerrero would do when he learned he was to be the trigger-man. It had to be him. No one else was skilled enough to make the necessary shots.


	6. Chapter 6

CHAPTER SIX

San Francisco, California  
two nights later

The cabby pulled to the roadside and stopped, but didn't turn off the engine. "Are you guys sure you wanna get out here? This place is downright spooky. There won't be any other hacks coming this way, not this late at night."

"It's okay, we're meeting friends," Chance said. He handed the driver two $50s as Guerrero and Winston exited the cab. "Keep the change."

"Okay, buddy, it's your funeral." The driver re-set his meter, put the car in gear, and wasted no time driving away.

They were deep inside Golden Gate Park, not far from the buffalo pasture. Not far from the tangled forest where the mysterious gingerbread house sometimes let itself be seen at Halloween. Chance found himself peering over his shoulder from time to time as they walked along. He noticed Winston and Guerrero doing the same. Someone watched them. Or some thing. They could feel it.

"How much farther?" Winston asked as they reached the crest of a steep little bump of a hill.

"Right over there."

On a smooth stretch of ground rested a tiny Hiller UH-12E4 helicopter, its rotors swirling lazily in the chill night air. With its Plexiglas bubble cockpit, its slender tail section, its long main rotor blades glimmering like transparent wings, it looked more like a giant dragonfly than a manufactured aircraft. Chance smiled. Small but powerful, the little copter could land and take off almost anywhere.

Julia stepped from the cock-pit and beckoned.

"Hurry," she called. "It's almost midnight."

As they neared the copter, Chance tried to get a look at the pilot. Aviator glasses with reflective silver lenses and a ball cap pulled low over his brow kept his- -or her- -face hidden. Why, he wondered would their pilot wear aviator glasses after dark? Maybe to hide glowing red eyes? He decided not to ask.

Clambering into the rear seat, he noticed Cedric, in broom form, lying on the cock-pit floor, its handle extending beneath the seat and into the tail section.

"What's with you, too lazy to fly on your own?"

Cedric's straws rendered a true-to-life rattlesnake's warning buzz.

"Cute trick. Learn that in Tombstone, did you?"

Cedric produced a bored-out-of-my-skull snore.

Guerrero and Winston squeezed into their share of the rear seat, muttering about the cramped quarters. Julia settled into the co-pilot's seat.

"What is this, when it's not a 12E4?" Chance asked.

Julia turned in her seat, rolled her eyes at Winston in warning. "Believe me, you don't want to know."

Oh, but he did want to know. He'd noticed that the big bull buffalo, normally grazing close by his harem, didn't seem to be around tonight.

The rotors' murmur increased to a roar as Julia and the pilot began chanting. In a moment the tiny craft soared into the sky.

Below, the lights of San Francisco twinkled and sparkled. Golden Gate Bridge stretched like a glowing necklace across the water. The copter's 'fishbowl' cock-pit gave a 365-degree panorama of the glittering city below.

Then it was gone. The only light not swallowed by utter blackness came from the copter's instrument panel.

"Oh, God, we're gonna die," Winston moaned.

"We'll be fine," Chance promised, and hoped he was right. "See, Guerrero's not spooked." In fact, Guerrero appeared to be asleep. Or he'd fainted.

Then, lights pierced the blackness outside the cock-pit. Not the unending chain of lights along the 21st century's Pacific coast. Chance gazed down, trying to orient himself. After a time, he recognized the shape of the coastline. They'd covered distance as well as time, he concluded as Half Moon Bay airport, twenty-some miles south of their lift-off point, came into view.

"Gotta tank up," Julia said as the copter began to descend. "This baby burns fuel like there's no tomorrow."

Chance grimaced at her choice of words.

"Need some help?" he asked as a fuel truck trundled out to meet them.

"Sure," Julia said. She unfastened her seatbelt. "Go over to the edge of the tarmac and pull a few armloads of grass." She giggled. "Just kidding."

They refueled again in Albuquerque, and grabbed a bite to eat. The pilot did not join them. Then, on to Dallas.

* * *

Dallas, Texas  
Thursday, November 21  
1963

Chance had flown into Dallas in his own time. He remembered two distinct landmarks visible for miles, the Bank of America skyscraper's green argon outline, and a glowing sphere atop Reunion Tower looking for all the world like Tesla's Wardenclyffe wireless energy transmitter. He wondered if, in any of the alternate universes, Tesla's wireless energy had eliminated the need for generated electricity.

The landmarks were gone.

Although Love Field's control tower stood sentinel, only a single runway was lighted. A red warning light blinked from the Cedar Hill radio transmitter. Downtown, with taller, modern buildings yet to be built, the Mobilgas logo, a red neon flying horse revolved in isolated splendor atop the Magnolia Building. A few doors beyond, a clock tower's hands pointed to 1:33.

The copter began to descend as it passed over the railroad depot. Dallas Union Terminal was a long, white block Beaux Arts structure built to consolidate the many railroad lines servicing the city after the turn of the century. Its tall Doric columns gleamed like ice in the lights running its length. Across the street in Ferris Plaza, a fountain sprayed the same lighted arcs of water as it did in 2012. Unlike Love Field, the railroad station was busy day and night. Tonight the depot was busier than usual. Tomorrow President Kennedy would arrive. Even his enemies wanted to say they saw him.

In the darkest corner of the farthest parking lot, the copter set down. Julia stepped out, Guerrero and Winston followed, then Chance.

A red and white 1959 Chevrolet Impala with its unique 'eyebrows and almond eyes' tailfins waited for them. The car from Joubert's assassination film.

"Is that a real Chevy?" Chance whispered to Julia, "Or does it morph into something else when no one's looking?"

"You better hope you don't find out," Julia said. "Honestly, Christopher!"

A manila envelope on the front seat contained driver's licenses, bogus Federal and Secret Service ID's, a 1963 street map, and keys for their rooms. To avoid implicating the Sisterhood if their plans went awry, Chance had requested motel rooms be secured for them. A peek in the trunk revealed luggage.

"Your rifle is in a compartment under the trunk floor," Julia said.

"I'll drive," Guerrero said.

"Nope, I'll drive," Winston said. "Folks'll think I'm your chauffeur. Should-a brought along a hat."

"Want me to conjure one?" Julia asked.

"No."

"Looks like everything you need is here," Julia said. "Do you want Cedric and me to show you the way to the motel?"

"I think we can find it," Chance said. "See you ilater this morning?"

"Nope. Cedric and I will be herding cattle." They were staying at a coven-owned dude ranch, where Cedric could frolic in equine form. "Then we're going shopping."

"You're always going shopping. Where's your transceiver?"

"Right here." She patted her jacket pocket.

"Make sure you carry it. We'll leave for Fort Worth to meet with Agent Hall about 11:30, so meet us at our motel no later than 11:00 PM."

He gave her a good night peck on the cheek and watched her saunter back to the copter. A moment after it was airborne, it blinked out.

**… … … … …**

The Ross Avenue Motel proclaimed itself "the South's Finest Colored Motel". The office was a two-story crème-colored stucco structure with a white-lettered black sign, the most prominent word of which was 'NO'. The place was filled to capacity.

Chance felt a twinge of guilt for occupying a room here when he could have easily stayed elsewhere. Dallas and much of the rest of the south still practiced segregation- -a practice Jack Kennedy hoped to end. Lodging for traveling blacks was not easy to find in 1963.

The rooms formed a U-shape beyond the office. A car-port separated each unit from its neighbor. Numbers 4, 5, and 6 were empty. Winston parked the Impala in Number 5.

Working silently to avoid disturbing their sleeping neighbors, the men unloaded suitcases from the trunk. As Julia had promised, beneath the trunk floor they found the rifle Chance requested. He had specified only semi-automatic, leaving it to the coven to select the make and model. Zipped inside a canvas carry case he found a World War II Garand M1. It didn't look new, but in the dim trunk light appeared perfectly maintained. He glanced at Guerrero, who was peering over his shoulder.

"Better leave it here so the maid doesn't stumble across it." Guerrero turned on his heel, stalked to his room and closed the door behind him.

Chance and Winston watched him go.

"He's not very happy about all this," Winston said as he closed the trunk and locked it.

"Yeah, well, neither am I.


	7. Chapter 7

_Author's note: my apologies to my German readers for fluffing JFK's "Ich bin ein Berliner" quote worse than he did. I ought to go back and fix it, but I'm not very confident about replacing chapters._

* * *

CHAPTER SEVEN

Dallas, Texas  
Thursday, November 21  
1963

Later that morning, after a breakfast no one felt much like eating, Chance, Winston, and Guerrero drove to Dealey Plaza.

Rain showers turned the pavement into a mirror reflecting the red, amber, and green of traffic lights. Traffic was light as they passed filling stations, pawn shops and liquor stores on the outskirts of downtown Dallas. Farther along, where skyscrapers turned surface streets into canyons, ladies with bouffant hair-dos under colorful umbrellas carried shopping bags from Niemen Marcus and Tiche's. Men in hats- -more fedoras than Stetsons- -lugged leather briefcases into and out of office buildings with striped white and green awnings over the entrances. No one spoke into cell phones nor carried iPods as they bustled along the sidewalks or paused to window-shop. Chance sat up and gaped when he spotted three tall, somber, white-Stetsoned men conversing beneath an awning, thumbs tucked behind enormous silver belt buckles. Texas Rangers.

"Go past Elm just a few feet," Chance told Winston as they neared Elm Street's intersection with Houston Street. "There's a street that runs right in front of the depository. Turn there."

Elm Street made a sharp left turn off Houston and angled away from the Texas School Book Depository. Winston by-passed it and turned left onto a block-long stretch of pavement that dead-ended at an empty lot. A handful of cars were parked on the highest ground to avoid mud puddles. Winston stopped the engine. They got out and looked around.

About fifty yards from the book depository stood a railroad control tower. Beyond the parking area, a vast assemblage of railroad tracks converged and diverged. A lone freight train rattled along a distant set of rails. To their left the back side- -the shooter's side- -of a stockade fence ran along the crest of the 'grassy knoll'. It kept the unsightly railroad yards from ruining the view from Dealey Plaza.

"Doesn't look like a killing field," Winston said.

Chance angled away from the fence, heading for the railroad trestle known locally as the Triple Underpass.

Beyond a concrete retaining wall they found a path leading to the trestle. It was a steep climb up the berm, but once they reached the top, a narrow walkway allowed pedestrians to walk along the tracks without interfering with passing trains.

The trestle commanded an excellent view of the plaza. Chance was surprised how dry and brown the park's vegetation was, rather than the springtime green artists' renderings pictured it. Nor was it the triangular shape most writers ascribed. While three streets cutting through it- -one straight down the middle- -did outline a triangle, the plaza _en toto_ formed a shape more closely resembling a half-pint "Dandy" liquor flask, with the Triple Underpass chopping off most of the neck. The grassy knoll with its white pergola formed the north-west edge of the bottle's Elm Street shoulder. Seldom mentioned was a matching pergola on the Commerce Street side of the bottle. Twin reflecting pools and tall white colonnades marked the triangle's Houston Street base.

"I didn't realize how close together everything is," Chance said. "It looks larger in photographs." It looked like a movie set, but entirely too real.

He felt like he could reach down and touch the stockade fence. He could see people moving past the windows of "Old Red". Completed in 1829, the red sandstone courthouse looked like a medieval castle mistakenly wedged in among its Art Deco neighbors. Union Terminal's gleaming whitewashed façade was a scant two blocks south. If Secret Service agents were scrutinizing the area, he saw no sign of them.

"It's a perfect place for an ambush," Winston said. "That Dal-Tex building across the way would be good, but the fence and those bushes on the grassy knoll give plenty of cover and the best escape route. We can park right below it."

The moment Chance let his gaze find the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository, the atmosphere changed from benign to sinister. It was like looking at a car wreck where you knew someone had been sliced to ribbons. He knew he shouldn't let his emotions run away with him. The building wasn't evil, hadn't planned the assassination. The plaza wasn't cursed. It didn't matter. His stomach clenched and he swallowed hard as he pictured Lee Harvey Oswald aiming his rifle from the Depository's sixth floor window.

"Let's get out of here," Guerrero said, and led them back the way they'd come.

**… … … … …**

That afternoon, they found a shooting range and practiced with the rifle.

Rifles had never been Chance's weapon of choice. When he was Junior, he preferred working close in, with poison, or garrote, or silenced handgun. Still, the Old Man had insisted his agents become proficient with every type of weapon they might need, from sling-shots to blow-guns to RPG's. Rifles were nothing new, and this was a beauty. The M1 Garand was one of the most powerful combat weapons ever made, easily accurate enough for sniping. A semi-automatic, it fired the eight rounds its magazine held as fast as the shooter pulled the trigger.

In addition to cleaning materials and boxes of practice ammunition, the Dallas coven had provided an unlabeled black box containing .300 Winchester Magnum shells with 175-grain Orca bullets. Specialty ammunition. Designed for assassinations. Enchanted to dissolve.

"Let's get this baby sighted in,"Guerrero said to Chance. "You Shoot. I'll tweek."

"I guess that means I'll spot," Winston said, and strolled off down range.

Chance filled a clip with practice ammunition, loaded it, and sighted on a target twenty-five yards away. With his cheek pressed against the stock, he drew a breath and held it, assessing how his heartbeat affected the movement of the scope cross-hairs. When the cross-hairs steadied over the bull's-eye, he let out his breath and squeezed the trigger.

Winston pointed his finger at the hole in the target, about two inches over and down from the bull's-eye. Guerrero moved in and as Chance held steady on the target, adjusted the scope until the cross-hairs centered over the hole.

"There."

Glancing up to make sure Winston was in the clear, Chance aimed at the bull's-eye again and fired.

Winston pointed at the hole, held up his fist, then two fingers.

"Why didn't we bring the radios?" Chance asked. "What's he saying?"

"Two centimeters off dead center," Guerrero translated. "Not good enough. Try again."

They repeated the firing and adjusting until Guerrero was satisfied, then changed the range to 100 yards and did it again.

Although Chance's shots went wild at least twice with every eight he fired, when they traded, Guerrero put eight rounds in a circle no larger than his fist at 500 yards each time he emptied the magazine. Guerrero was simply the better shot and always had been.

Chance had not yet found the courage to tell Guerrero he had to be the trigger-man. Winston, however, scented something in the wind. Waiting until Guerrero was out of earshot, he asked, "You gonna just spring it on him when the time comes? That's pretty low."

"Is it that obvious?"

"Is to me. What if he says no?"

Chance didn't have an answer. Time was running out.

When Guerrero was satisfied with the rifle's accuracy, the men returned to their motel to wait until it was time to drive to Fort Worth and meet with Secret Service agent Cliff Hall.

* * *

Ft Worth, Texas  
Early Friday morning  
November 22, 1963

It was a little past midnight when, several blocks from the Texas Hotel, Chance spotted the "coffeehouse" where, his research indicated, after seeing the Kennedys settled for the night, Cliff Hall had gone hoping to find a meal. He left his team in the car and strolled across the street. Smoke billowed out when he opened the coffeehouse door.

Inside, he paid the one dollar cover charge to the bouncer lounging near the entrance, and looked around for Hall. It was dark in the coffeehouse, the few lights still on over the empty stage and bar. Slogans hand-lettered in white paint embellished walls either a very dark red or maybe black, no way to be certain. He smiled when he spotted one reading "Make love, not war".

Floor pillows strewn in front of the stage made it apparent dancing wasn't encouraged. Sofas and a few tables lined the walls. Only a handful of tie-dye or leotard-clad customers remained, so the dark-haired man in the suit on a stool at the coffee bar was a sure bet. Chance sauntered over.

"Agent Hall?"

Cliff Hall looked up, surprised to be addressed other than by 'Hey, man….' "That's me," he said. "Help you?"

Hall didn't want to help anyone. He was bone-weary, his empty stomach ached. Not accustomed to strong drink, he'd sipped one too many Tom Collinses at the Press Club when they said the food was gone. A long, chilly walk to his room at the Texas Hotel awaited him. He wished her were home, in his bed.

Or better yet, in his kitchen, with Mary fixing him a sandwich. Today was so hectic he and the other agents on JFK's protection detail didn't have a moment to grab even a snack. He wasn't complaining, mind, but why did the damned hotel see fit to close their kitchen the moment word came the Kennedys wouldn't want a meal? For some reason, there wasn't a café for miles that stayed open past 10:00 PM. Crazy Texans.

"My name is Christopher Chance," the man said. "I need to speak to you privately."

"Who?"

"Christopher Ch- -"

"Never mind, I heard you. I'm in no mood for games, buddy. Either tell me who you really are, or go find some other chump to hustle."

Hall glared at the blonde man straddling the stool beside his. He looked like another Secret Service agent, taller than average, athletic build, hair not quite military-short. Dressed in a suit and tie. But Christopher Chance was a myth, the imaginary go-to man who found ways to neutralize threats police couldn't touch and G-men didn't credence. He never expected Mrs. Kennedy to actually find such a man, let alone have him show up in Ft. Worth, as if he'd beamed down from the Starship _Enterprise._

"I really am Christopher Chance. Jacqueline Kennedy…sent word she need help. I'm here to- -"

"Pipe down. Let's take a walk. This place gives me the willies."

Outside, the air was cool and fresh and blessedly free of alcohol fumes and smoke not coming from tobacco. Hall produced a pack of cigarettes from one pocket, a Zippo lighter from another. "Smoke?"

"No thanks."

Hall lit up. "I thought you were the figment of someone's imagination."

Chance smiled. "That's how we- -my team and I- -maintain our anonymity. Making people who don't need to know think we don't exist. How do you suppose Jackie heard about me?"

"That's _Mrs. Kennedy_ to you. Probably some jackass who thought he was doing her a favor. Anyhow, now that you're here, why don't you turn around and go back to that anonymity you're so proud of?"

"I wish I could, but you're going to need our help. I know what's going to happen in Dallas. The man planning to do the job can't do it alone. If you want Kennedy taken out clean, you have to let us help"

Hall stopped in his tracks. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"You know exactly what I'm talking about. It's been planned for months. And I know why. The man in the White House isn't Jack Kennedy. He's a ringer. Maybe a Russian agent. No one knows how the substitution occurred. Only a few top people know the truth. Rather than let the American people find out and lose complete faith in their government, or let an imposter unleash some unimaginable disaster, it was decided to remove him."

Hall felt the blood drain from his face. His head swam and his knees threatened to buckle. Damn alcohol. Damn missing his last two meals. And damn the sonovabitch masquerading as Jack Kennedy.

"How could you possibly…?"

"All that matters is I do. I also know this. No matter what you've been told, Lee Harvey Oswald is a piss-poor shot who stands as good a chance of killing Jacki- -er, Mrs. Kennedy- -as he does JFK. Probably he'll miss her, but he'll shoot Governor Connelly, damn near hit an innocent by-stander down the street, and finally get off a lucky shot that lodges permanently in Kennedy's brain. If Kennedy survives, the brain damage changes him into a maniac seeking world domination."

"What are you, some psychic whack-o?"

Chance grinned, a surprisingly engaging grin that somehow made Hall want very much to trust him, no matter how big a mistake he knew it would be. Still, the man had information no one could possibly possess. Hall had to play along until he discovered how the man got it and what he planned to do.

"I'm no psychic," Chance said. "Sometimes I think 'whack-o' might not be too far off. But I'm the guy who's got a car waiting where no one will pay it any attention, and a thermos of hot coffee, and if you don't mind peanut butter and jelly, a couple of sandwiches. Let's go talk. There's no time to waste."

Walking up to the car, Hall wondered what in the world he was getting himself into.

The man called Chance introduced his team. Winston, a football player-sized Afro-American, Guerrero, a jockey-sized badass in bell bottoms and a tie-dyed shirt, and Julia, the sexiest redhead he'd seen in many a year.

The aroma of hot coffee gurgling from a thermos filled the air, and a Saran-Wrapped sandwich appeared. Hall almost whimpered with gratitude.

After he swallowed several bites, Chance asked him, "How'd your guys figure out he's an imposter?"

"Little things at first," Hall replied. Since the man already knew, there was no point in dissembling. Give a little information, maybe get a lot. "He chose different food. Liked different music. At first we thought he was still gung-ho from his top-over in Ireland. But that wasn't all."

Hall swallowed another bite of sandwich.

"He changed doctors. Stopped seeing Admiral Burkley and brought in a new man who seemed to work wonders. One day I saw him pick up John-John and swing him high over his head. Because of his back, it's something he's never been able to do. We wondered what sort of medicine this new doctor prescribed. Some of us could use some extra zip…. When we tried to look into the doctor's background, we were told in no uncertain terms to mind our own business."

Hall accepted more coffee from the thermos.

"We checked anyway, but by then the new man had all his papers in place. The biggest difference was, Kennedy stopped doodling."

"He what?" Chance asked.

"He stopped doodling. He doodled constantly. Always had a pen in his hand and a pad to write on whether he was in a meeting or just chatting on the phone. He took notes, of course, but he also sometimes jotted the same word over and over. Drew stick figures. Geometric scribbles. All very messy.

"After he got back from Berlin, everything changed. He still took notes, but they were precise. Aligned. The scribbling stopped. It's hard to describe, but if you put the 'before' doodles beside the 'after' ones, the difference jumps right out at you."

"Has Mrs. Kennedy said…anything that indicates she might know what happened?"

Hall sighed. "I have a pretty good rapport with Mrs. K. I was there when John-John was born. I rushed her to the hospital when Patrick came. I sneak cigarettes to her. But the one time I sort of hinted that something…wasn't right, she just gave me that little smile and said, 'I'm so thankful John's health has taken a turn for the better. Aren't you?' What the hell could I say? But that was when we decided to check his fingerprints."

"And?"

"And they're close. Damned close. But different enough we know he's…someone else. Half-brother, maybe, the way Joe Kennedy got around in those days. Where in hell he's been the last 44 years is a mystery. It's like he popped out of a rabbit hole somewhere. Now suppose," Hall said, "you tell me how you and your team fit into this. You're not CIA or FBI."

"I can tell you," Chance said, "but you're not gonna believe it."

**… … … … …**

The Chevy rolled to a stop across the street from the Texas Hotel. As Hall reached for the door handle, Chance said, "There's one last matter you need to be very clear about."

"What's that?" Hall didn't think he could possibly absorb any more, let alone process it with any degree of clarity.

"You must never admit any knowledge of our intervention. Someone will go to extreme lengths to destroy evidence suggesting Oswald doesn't act alone. We don't know who. It's not our job to find out. We do know credible witnesses who offer proof to the contrary suffer personal ridicule, professional discrediting, and way too many 'accidental' deaths."

"No. That's not part of the plan- -"

"Maybe not, but it happens, take my word for it. They'll grill you on this, Hall. No matter what you know or see, or hear, never deviate from the Warren Commission's conclusion: one man acting alone. Three shots, from behind and above. That'll keep you alive and your family safe."

Hall reached for the door handle again. The door hinge creaked as he stepped into the street. It was all just too much. Too unreal. He'd gone too long without sleep. He glanced at his watch and shook his head.

"You know, I have a feeling I'm going to wake up in, oh, about three hours and believe this was all a very strange dream."

Chance gave a chuckle that sounded as weary as Hall felt. "As long as you remember we're the good guys."

They watched Hall's tall, lean figure cross the empty street and enter the hotel lobby. He looked like he bore the weight of the world on his shoulders.

"Are we really, dude?" Guerrero asked. "Are we really the good guys here?"


	8. Chapter 8

CHAPTER EIGHT  
Dallas, Texas  
November 22, 1963

As morning broke over Dallas, Texas, the rain that fell throughout the night gave way to puffy white clouds dotting sunny blue skies. The presidential limousine, waiting at Love Field for the Kennedys' arrival, would not need its clear plastic 'bubble' top today.

President Kennedy had two speeches to give in Ft. Worth before boarding Air Force One for Dallas. Cliff Hall stuck close to Jacqueline. Such huge crowds made her uncomfortable, no matter how cordial the people might be.

Cordial indeed were the people who came to see Kennedy, more than 2000 strong at Love Field alone. Cheers and waving flags greeted the president and his wife as they descended from the plane, Jack in coat and tie, Jacqueline wearing a raspberry pink suit and matching hat. Someone handed her a huge bouquet of roses the color of blood.

As Air Force One was rolling to a stop on the tarmac at Love Field, Julia watched Chance's team police their rooms for any trace evidence they might have overlooked. At last confident nothing that might identify them remained, Chance led his men outside. No one had anything to say.

As they got into the Chevy, Julia said, "Oh, wait! I'm supposed to give you these." She draped a chain holding a metal tag over each man's head. "Tuck them inside your shirts."

"What's this for?" Guerrero asked, eying the tag. "I don't carry I.D."

"They're not I.D. tags, silly. They only look like them. They're really EADs."

All three men looked blank.

"Emergency Avoidance Devices. They contain a spell that will render you invisible. Just give them a good squeeze and - -poof!- -you disappear. These are the upgraded versions with a collateral amnesia component. Anyone not wearing a negation charm will forget who they were accosting and why. Don't use them unless you have to."

She glanced at each man in turn, making sure each followed what she said.

"So, you walk away from your situation. Get as far as you can in the ten minutes before the spell wears off. Try to find a place to become visible again where you don't give someone a heart attack by popping out of thin air."

Julia chose not to mention the tags also carried a location beacon for retrieving the wearer's body if something went horribly wrong.

"Goddess speed, and blessed be," she intoned. "Chance and I will meet you at the pick-up point."

* * *

Winston backed the Chevy up to the incline below the stockade fence and turned off the ignition. Presently Chance said, "Let's roll."

For a time, no one moved. This was no band of outraged patriots preparing to wrest back control of a hijacked Boeing 757. They were going to murder a president.

Chance lifted the Garand from the floor of the rear seat and slipped off the canvas guncase. Watched Guerrero emerge from the passenger seat looking as stiff and gaunt as an octogenarian. He wore the same kaki coveralls Joubert's film had shown. Chance had to stop himself from looking toward the County Records building, exposing his face to the unknown cameraman.

A desultory breeze stirred the oak trees on the opposite side of the fence. It carried the odor of distant stockyards and the chuffing of a switch-engine working in the railroad yards. Heat waves shimmered up from cars left in the parking area below. Chance risked a glance over the fence. There, standing on the wall extending beyond the pergola below, a man aimed his camera at the street where the motorcade would pass. Abraham Zapruder. Across Elm Street at the curbside, two women, one in a red raincoat, also fiddled with a camera.

Hearing the soft crunch of Guerrero's shoes, Chance turned and held out the Garand. Guerrero didn't touch it.

"I already told you, I can't fuckin' do it. You're askin' me to kill JFK."

"It's not JFK."

"What if we're wrong, dude? What if there was a mix-up on those print cards, then what?"

Chance laid his free hand on Guerrero's shoulder. "We're not wrong."

"Yeah, like we've never made a mistake."

"Not this time. You heard Agent Hall. He knows, too."

Guerrero jerked free. "What happened to _no man deserves to die_, huh? That only applies when it's convenient? You want it done, do it yourself. I'm outta here."

He pivoted and started down the slope to the Chevy.

"Guerrero."

He stopped, but didn't turn around."

"I don't trust myself to make a clean hit. To bring him down without killing anyone else. Neither can Winston."

Chance imbued his plea with every ounce of blandishment he possessed, the same persuasion he used to finesse his way past top-notch security teams, or charm an obdurate woman into bed. He felt as contemptible as a man could ever feel.

"Forget it, dude. If you go through with this, we're finished. I'm through."

Chance closed his eyes and let his head droop in acknowledgement. In a way, he was relieved. He couldn't expect Guerrero to do something the man considered so heinous. He hated himself for asking. He hated what he had to do.

From over on Houston Street he heard people shouting and applauding. It wasn't too late to stop what was going to happen. Hell, he could race down the hill, run up Elm Street, waving the Garand and yelling like a madman. That would bring the motorcade to a screeching halt. Might get him a Secret Service bullet through the heart. Wasn't that better than letting Kennedy die?

Except, he reminded himself as he brought the Garand to his shoulder, it wasn't Kennedy.

**… … … … …**

On the sixth floor of the Texas Schoolbook Depository Building, Lee Harvey Oswald stepped from behind the cartons he'd piled around the window he'd chosen. The floor was vacant now. Even that Afro guy, Williams, who took forever to munch down his fried chicken lunch had finally gone. Left little bits of his lunch for a damn mouse he was trying to tame.

Why in hell would anyone want to eat lunch here, anyway? It was stifling, even so late in the year. The six floor was a maze, cartons stacked to within inches of the ceiling. School books didn't need air conditioning. Quiet, too. No one's transistor radio blaring, nobody arguing who was the best halfback, Frank Clarke or Bobby Mitchell. He heard the damn mouse skittering somewhere among the cartons.

He opened the window to let some of the trapped heat escape. To blend this open window into the dozens of other windows opened to let eager spectators along the motorcade route get a clear look at the president. It would be their last look, at this one, anyway.

He couldn't believe how lax presidential security was.

_All the easier for me._

Street noise drifted in. People laughing, calling to friends. No vehicle noises, though. Traffic had been re-routed. Then the crowd's wild yelling and applause told Oswald Kennedy's limousine was almost directly below.

**… … … … …**

Heart in his throat and mouth dry as sand, Chance peered through the scope as the limousine approached. Midnight blue, so glossy the images of people along the street reflected on its sides. American flag on one front fender, Presidential Standard on the other, fluttering. The line of sight was as perfect as anyone could ask.

Five accurate shots in eight tries. He wouldn't risk $2.00 on a dog-race with odds like those.

One at a time he wiped his palms on his trousers and resettled the Garand. He must not miss. A world's fate was at stake. He held his breath, listening for Oswald's first shot.

Because he expected it, Chance easily detected the faint crack, more like an exploding firecracker than a rifle shot. He saw Governor Connelly flinch and clutch his abdomen. For a split second, he lost sight of his target. He had to think of Kennedy that way. Target. Then, blinking sudden moisture from his eyes, he squeezed off his first round.

"Jackie, I'm so sorry." He fired again.

In the street below, everything came to a standstill that seemed to extend into eternity. Then all hell broke loose.

Agent Hall raced forward from the car behind the limo, grabbed the limo's hand-grip, stumbled as the vehicle lurched into motion. He scrambled onto the rear deck, grabbed Jacqueline and shoved her backward, threw himself over her and the president's body as the limo sped away.

Throughout the plaza, people shouted and milled about in confusion. Adults grabbed kids and threw them to the ground, shielding them with their bodies as Agent Hall shielded the Kennedys. Sirens wailed their banshee death-cries.

Dallas Motor Officer Bobby Hargis was cutting across the grass, heading straight for the fence line. Others- -Texans who damn well knew gunfire when they heard it- -were climbing the slope, seeking the shooter.

Chance didn't move.

Guerrero appeared at his side, snatched the Garand, and disassembled it with quick, precise motions. He shoved the pieces into a waiting canvas tool bag.

"Get ready," he said, his voice flat, expressionless. "They're coming up the hill. That motorcycle cop's almost here. Do your job."

It sounded so much like Joubert, Chance almost looked around for him. Guerrero glared at him for a moment, then turned and made for the Chevy. The engine was already running.

Guerrero, Chance thought. Always has my back. No matter how dirty the job.

He swallowed. Squared his shoulders as the Chevy drove casually away. Reached for his bogus Secret Service Commission Book, and trudged off along the fence to sidetrack the Texans looking for someone to lynch.

* * *

The pick-up point was the abandoned bath house at White Rock Lake Park, some ten miles as the crow flies from Dealey Plaza.

Once a popular recreation site, a majestic bath house the centerpiece of lake activities, the park was little used now except by teens hot-rodding the shoreline drive encircling the lake, or partying in the bath house parking area. Graffiti marred the once pristine walls, food wrappers, soft-drink cans and liquor bottles littered the grounds. Weeds growing through cracks in the concrete stood almost as tall as the padlocked entry doors.

"Are you sure this is where we're supposed to wait?" Winston asked. He tugged off his chauffeur's and wiped sweat from his brow.

Guerrero pointed to a sign above the entrance. "It says 'BATH HOUSE'. It looks abandoned to me."

"I'm gonna pull around behind. The less people notice we're here, the better."

They had seen no other people, no other vehicles. Just the same, Winston did not want to draw anyone's attention. Not today, when everyone was suspect and strangers especially so. He got out and studied the water, the cat-tails growing along the shore, the ducks drifting on the tranquil surface.

"I'm thinking we ought to drop that rifle into the lake," he said.

Guerrero picked up a rock, tossed it in, and watched the ripples expand outward. "Water's not deep enough to keep it from being found someday."

"Who's gonna look for it? They got the murder weapon. The one they want to have."

Guerrero shrugged and turned away. Winston left the Garand in the tool bag. Back in the Chevy, he turned on the radio. Broadcasters struggled to fill the airwaves with any information they could acquire, accurate or not.

After about fifteen minutes, Winston turned it off. "Shouldn't Chance and Julia be here by now?"

"Chill, dude. He's gotta get clear to meet her before they come here. Traffic's gonna be insane for a while."

Roadblocks were everywhere. Thousands of people who'd poured into downtown Dallas were all trying to find their way home. It had taken Winston and Guerrero 45 minutes to reach the park.

Winston kicked at a liquor bottle. "Should-a brought a fishin' pole."

**… … … … …**

In Dealey Plaza, Julia and the Cedric-cycle waited for Chance to join them at the Commerce Street pergola. She watched people drifting away from the death scene. Many still clustered at the entrance to the book depository. Some gathered at the Criminal Courts building where a flurry of activity had drawn their attention a few minutes ago. Others simply stood, looking bewildered.

She saw men in police uniforms come and go, men in dark suits doing the same, staring up at the sixth floor window, examining the stockade fence. People by the score tramped up the grassy knoll, obscuring any possible evidence the shooter might have left. Which was good, under the circumstances.

"Christopher, where are you?" Julia muttered.

Heading off the police and other witnesses and disappearing into the crowd would take some time, but close to an hour had passed since the shooting. He should have joined her before now.

She debated calling him. Felt in her pocket for the transceiver. No. If he was in a jam, he didn't need a radio transmission complicating things. He had his EAD if things got really sticky. She nearly jumped out of her skin when her own transceiver crackled in her ear.

Winston's voice said, "Julia?"

She glanced around, making certain no one was near before answering.

"I'm here."

"What's happening? Are you and Chance okay?"

"I'm fine, but Christopher isn't here yet.

"Where the hell is he?" Winston bellowed. "Did you call him?"

Julia's ear rang from the blast of Winston's voice. She removed the ear-piece and transferred it to the other ear. "Don't shout like that! No, I didn't call. I was afraid to risk it. What do you want me to do?"

"If he's not there in five minutes, risk it. Then call me."

**… … … … …**

The grounds outside Parkland Memorial Hospital looked like a kicked-over ant hill when Chance arrived.

The Presidential limousine sat empty, its bloody rear seat and deck exposed, for the moment unguarded. Jacqueline's bouquet lay crushed on the floor. The motorcycle officers who escorted the limo to Parkland now patrolled on foot, trying to keep the curious at bay. More arrived every minute.

Drivers and passengers abandoned their cars willy-nilly in their haste to reach the hospital emergency entrance. Dark sedans disgorged stern-looking men with badges pinned on their lapels. Radio commentators and television crews struggled with their unwieldy cameras and microphones, cables streaming like spilled intestines from each station's van. Newspaper reporters lucky enough to possess radio-telephones in their vehicles crowded as close as they could get. Civilians with Brownies and Instamatics snapped pictures of everything and everyone. Vultures.

Chance had considered contacting Julia, letting her know he'd decided to come to Parkland. She'd only argue. When he was done here, he'd check in.

Nurses and orderlies raced up and down the hall leading to Trauma Room One where doctors fought a losing battle to revive John F. Kennedy. Police, Secret Service agents, men in suits who might have been anyone got in each other's way. Someone yelled "Clear this hallway! Now!"

Chance worked his way through the throng, his counterfeit FBI badge a talisman of admission. The Secret Service ID he'd used on the grassy knoll wouldn't work here, the agents all knew each other. As he passed a haggard young man in a rumpled suit, he heard someone tell him, "Agent Ready, I need you to find a priest."

A little farther down the hall he saw Jacqueline, seated on a folding chair, another secret Service agent on guard inches away.

He spotted Cliff Hall in a small office, talking on a phone. Ordering a casket. He waited in the doorway until Hall put down the phone. "Got a minute?"

"Yeah."

"We've gotta tell her," Chance said. "So she'll know what to do about the autopsy."

"I wish to hell I knew some way to avoid it. It'll be touch and go, keeping anyone from finding out this guy was way too healthy to be JFK. They're already squabbling over jurisdiction." His voice dripped disdain. He stood, looking as debilitated as a death-camp survivor. "Wait here. I'll go get her."

Jacqueline's face bore no expression whatsoever. She walked with stiff, jerky steps, as if she might at any moment topple over. When she saw Chance, she went rigid.

"I didn't expect miracles," she said, but I hoped, prayed, you'd stop that man before he did this."

'That man', not 'them'. 'He', not 'they'. The pall of guilt was already cast solely upon Lee Harvey Oswald's shoulders.

"I can't tell you how much I regret…what happened," Chance said. "But there's something you need to know. I know it will be difficult to understand, but…your husband didn't die in Dealey Pl- -"

"He's _alive_?"

The hope flaring in her eyes like two tiny novae broke Chance's heart.

"How can that be? My God, I saw his head explode. I touched him- -he's ice cold. You _saved _him? I want to see- -"

She broke off, pivoted and took three frantic strides toward the door before Hall caught her arm and drew her to a halt. Gently turned her to face Chance.

"Mrs. Kennedy, please. You need to hear the rest."

Chance swallowed the lump in his throat. "I…didn't say that very well. The…man in the car with you…wasn't Jack Kennedy. He was an imposter. We don't know his true identity- -"

The slap came from nowhere, loud as yet another gunshot, stunning him. His first coherent thought was amazement that anyone as fragile as Jacqueline seemed could pack such a wallop.

His next thought- -why?- -was answered before he drew breath to ask.

"You_ fool_," she spat. Her eyes only moments before glowing with hope now glared at him with white-hot hate. "Do you think I didn't know that? I've known all along. Why do you think I hired you to protect him?"

Chance glanced at Hall, who shrugged minutely.

"You knew?"

"Of course I knew."

Jacqueline took a step closer. So close he could smell the congealed blood on her skirt. For a moment he expected her to go for his throat with nothing but her nails or teeth.

"Do you think I wouldn't know my own husband? The father of my children? I know every scar on his body. Every nuance of his voice. How he sounds when he snores. To be blunt, I know how he makes love. I knew it wasn't Jack the first time we were intimate.

"I don't know, either, who he really is." She stopped. Coughed. "Was. I know he was changing this country for the better. I know he was working for world peace. I know _this_ man was _faithful _to me. And you let him die."

I did worse than that, Chance thought as she pushed past Hall and stormed out, I pulled the trigger.

"That," Hall said with a deep sigh, "was the last thing I expected her to say. I should have guessed when she let him move into her bedroom. Started calling him John instead of Jack. I better go make sure she doesn't…." Hall's voice trailed off as he followed Widow Kennedy into the hallway.

No one paid any attention as Chance left the hospital. As he threaded his way through the jammed parking lot, Julia's voice whispered in his ear.

He yanked the earpiece out. Glanced around to make sure no one was watching and worked his shirt and tee-shirt free on his trousers. Worked his hand underneath. His fingers tangled with the EAD tag- -what the hell? He'd forgotten he was wearing it. Then he found the transceiver, grasped it and ripped it off. Dropped it, and crushed it with his heel.

* * *

"Wha'd'ya mean, you 'let him go'?" Winston roared. "Go _where_?"

It was late. The breeze riffling the surface of White Rock Lake carried a wintery chill. In Washington, D.C., Lyndon Baines Johnson prowled the grounds of his residence, the Elms, the mantle of 36th president of the United States dragging at his shoulders like a millstone. In the Presidential Suite at Bethesda Naval Hospital, Jacqueline Kennedy finally let herself shed her held-back tears. In the basement morgue, Agent Cliff Hall took one last official look at Kennedy's body. He wondered if he would ever know the truth.

Julia shivered inside her jacket, as much from Winston's rage as the dropping temperature. "Mr. Winston, please, I'm trying to explain."

Earlier, she waited five minutes as Winston instructed , then tried to radio Christopher. By then he was out of range, or couldn't or wouldn't respond.

Winston had wanted to charge straight back to Dealey Plaza to search for him. Only after she revealed the tracking device in the EADs could she extract a promise to remain out of sight in White Rock Lake.

She took a reading, climbed on Cedric, and set off to find Chance. It soon became apparent he had joined the people congregating at Parkland Hospital. It made her blood run cold.

"Oh, Christopher, you're not going to do something stupid. You're not going to turn yourself in? They'll tear you to pieces." Never mind what a mess it would make of history if one of the grassy knoll shooters took a notion to confess.

She left Cedric several blocks from the hospital. Not an inch of parking space any closer remained. Worried people clogged the spaces between vehicles left with doors standing open, keys in the ignitions, some motors still running. Everyone looked shocked. Stunned. Appalled.

Hidden amid a cluster of vehicles, she pressed TRANSMIT and whispered, "Christopher? Are you there?"

She spotted him, then, walking through the maze of cars. He stopped. His reaction was minute, but she was sure he heard her. Then his hand grasped the ear-piece. A moment later, the transceiver hit the gravel. Her own ear-piece gave a piercing howl as the transceiver shattered.

He approached a car, glanced inside, then slipped into the driver's seat as if he owned it. Started the engine and drove sedately away. She followed on Cedric for a time, keeping well back as Chance took the freeway toward whatever Hell he was creating for himself. When he headed south toward the Gulf of Mexico, she broke off pursuit and turned Cedric back toward White Rock Lake.

"He needs time," Julia said now as Winston loomed over her, his face contorted with fury. "We need to leave him alone for a while."

"What do you know about what he needs?" Guerrero asked. His whisper made Julia shiver. She couldn't look at him.

"I…you're right, of course. But you've seen him through other bad times. Didn't he want solitude? Crave it?"

"So we're going to just leave him here? In the Past? No. Way." Winston's fingers curled as if he were choking something. Or someone.

"No, certainly not. Not for forever." They heard the murmur of an approaching helicopter. "But I need to get you two home. Then I'll come back for him. I promise."

Winston gave in first, muttering threats as he clambered into the tiny copter and buckled the straining seatbelt.

Guerrero fixed Julia with an unblinking stare. "If anything happens to him, if you don't bring him back, I will hunt you down no matter what time period you try to hide in. If you think the Inquisition was ugly, you'll wish that's where you were when I find you. Got me?"

"I understand."

"I hope you do." Guerrero stomped off to join Winston in the copter.

Shaking a little, Julia loaded Cedric and buckled herself in beside the pilot. She only hoped she could deliver what she promised.


	9. Chapter 9

CHAPTER NINE  
the Gulf of Mexico  
1963 - 1964

After Guerrero's threat, Endora's tongue-lashing scarcely registered on Julia's self-preservation scale. Life as a lowly amphibian was infinitely preferable to watching over her shoulder for a vengeance-hungry hit-man.

Although she could monitor Chance's where-abouts from the present, it seemed wisest, under the circumstances, to return to 1963, and stick close. He would run out of money soon. He was driving a stolen car. If vagrancy didn't get him thrown in the clink, Grand Theft Auto would. It shouldn't be long before he was ready to come home.

But Chance showed no indication of returning to Dallas to make contact with the coven. Nor did he head for Maryland to seek help from Kassandra Parker. Instead, he stopped somewhere in Galveston. For three days the EAD showed no activity. Fearing he'd thrown it away as he had the radio transceiver, Julia set out on the Cedric-cycle.

"Find Mr. Chance," she told her broom.

Tenacious as a Hellhound, in no time at all Cedric located Chance in a seedy tavern a short walk from the aging Santa Fe Railroad depot on Galveston Island. A sputtering orange neon sign proclaimed the establishment 'The Clam hell', its center 's' no longer producing light.

Julia parked Cedric and gave him an affectionate pat on the front fender. "Well done, Darling."

Not wanting to attract undue attention, with a quick swirl of smoke, Julia camouflaged her appearance. Looking like a dowdy, fiftyish bar-fly, she edged through the tavern's door.

Huge fishing nets strung between artificial palm trees held paper mache starfish, conch shells, and glass floats. "Walk Like a Man" by the Four Seasons, blared from a jukebox, the "clack" of billiard balls punctuating the lyrics.

Seamen spending end-of-voyage pay packets filled the room with shouts and laughter. Men in shore-leave 'civvies' or tknitted sweaters and dungarees swarmed the bar, demanding beers or "Seven and Seven!" Two bartenders hustled to keep up. Although only a little past six PM, the place already reeked of tobacco, spilled beer, and male sweat.

After a moment, she spotted Chance. He sat alone at a table, sipping from an Old Fashioned glass, which he topped off from an unlabeled black bottle. Two others stood empty nearby. When she reached his table, she saw he hadn't shaved for several days. Nor showered, she noticed with a grimace she didn't try to conceal.

She wanted to shout at him. Smack him for scaring them all. Instead, she kept her voice calm and fond, like a nanny finding her favorite toddler anointing himself from the Hershey's chocolate syrup squeeze bottle.

"Christopher. Look at you. You're a mess."

"Got tha' right," Chance agreed. "How'd ya find me?"

"Cedric."

"Figgers." He lifted his glass. "So, Red, want a shot?"

"No, thank you. I think you better come with me now. Your friends are terribly worried."

To her right, the resounding "_whack_" of a cue ball striking the racked billiard balls signaled a new game. Chance glanced that way for a moment, then back at Julia.

"Tell 'em you find me and I'm fine."

Julia drew out a chair and seated herself across from him. Her fingers unobtrusively danced a 'taste nasty' spell on the bottle's contents. "I can't, Christopher. You're not fine."

"Prob'ly won't be. You better make yourself scarce before someone wants to say hello."

"No one will pay any attention to me." She wondered if he saw through her disguise, or was just too hammered to notice how frumpy she looked.

"Tha's good, 'cause I've rescued my last damsel in distress."

A whoop went up from the billiard table as someone sank a Hail Mary shot. Chance poured again from the bottle. Drunk as he seemed, his hand was rock-steady. She waited for him to sip from the be-spelled whiskey. He held the glass but didn't drink.

"Would you like to go back to the ashram for a while? Cedric and I can take you there. Right now, if you want."

He peered at her with the first sign of interest he'd displayed since she walked into the bar. Then he slumped in his chair.

"Nope. Got other plans."

"Really? What might those plans be, Christopher?"

"I'm shippin' out. On the _Sea Witch_. Like the name? The crew - when she can get one - call her the _Sea Bitch_ 'cause she makes their lives miserable."

Julia jolted to her feet. "No! Not the _Sea Witch_! My uncle served on her. She's a widow-maker!"

The ship, a tramp freighter chugging her way along the Gulf of Mexico coastline, seemed determined to commit suicide. She made regular headlines, snagging herself on every hidden reef, catching fire for no known reason, steaming directly into the path of typhoons with eerie regularity. The Coast Guard Cutter _Cahoone_'s red-haired lady skipper, dispatched to her rescue three times in five days, threatened to sink the _Witch_ herself. Experienced crewmen shunned her like a graveyard at midnight.

"So I've heard," Chance said. "Makes it all the easier for me to get a berth."

"Hey, Gage!" a voice called. A man wearing a skullcap and lugging a duffle made his way between tables. He clapped Chance on the shoulder. "Get your ass in gear. The _Bitch_ sails in - Hey, who's this, yer ol' lady?"

Chance pushed to his feet and bent to retrieve his own bag from the floor. "My sister," he said, giving the seaman a squint-eyed glare. "You don't need to meet her." He pushed past Julia, then paused. "Hellova nose that Cedric's got. Give him my best." He turned and walked out the door.

With a heavy heart, Julia watched him go, then followed him out. She understood he needed some time, but she didn't know how she would explain it to Endora.

As Julia left the bar, one of the men playing pool crossed to Chance's table. "Hey Gage! Hey, Lady," he shouted, "you fergot yer bottle!" He picked the bottle up, took a few steps as if to follow, then paused. Shook the bottle. Smiled.

"Aw, hell, they'll never miss it." The man took a long, healthy pull. After a moment, his eyes bulged and a stream of amber liquid spewed from his mouth. "Arraaaugh! Gee-sus that's nasty! What'n'hell is this stuff, horse piss?"

* * *

It wasn't his first voyage on a freighter. The first time, Junior was hiding from relentless Paris authorities and Mohamed Al-Fayed's hit-men, all seeking the mysterious American who somehow knew about the plot to kill Princess Diana of Wales.

He'd been something of a dock-rat as a kid. He and Gramps frequently visited the waterfront, watching the huge ocean-going vessels, the cruise ships, the private yachts come into port and depart for secret and mysterious destinations.

"Join the Navy when you grow up," Gramps had urged. "See the world."

But Chance had wanted to see it from 30,000 feet, and became a pilot.

Quite by accident, Junior encountered Atherton Gerard, an RAF pilot enrolled in the same advanced training program he was taking. Over a few beers, Junior learned Atherton's father was in service to the Crown. After confessing to a pathetically juvenile crush on Princess Di, he was blown away when Ath, through his father, arranged an introduction to the princess during a visit she made to Canada.

From the moment she extended her hand and murmured "Delighted to meet you," Junior would have delivered the moon, had she asked for it. He was furious when he discovered the plot to murder her. More than that, he made up his mind to prevent it.

Despite his desperate efforts, he failed.

Not daring to risk a commercial flight home, he arranged passage on a States-bound freighter. They carried a few passengers then, either as paying customers or work-for-passage adventurers. Needing to keep out of sight, Junior paid his way. But he watched and listened and learned. There was little else to do on a ship with no gym, no casino, and worst of all, no library.

So he knew port from starboard. He knew fore from aft. He knew bulkhead and keel, and to say "fo'c's'le" when he meant "forecastle". He didn't know he would hurt like hell, his first two weeks working at sea.

Although Chance always kept physically fit and regularly trounced younger, quicker, more agile sparring partners at Gold's Gym, the ensuing days aboard the _Bitch_ both toned and taxed his body.

Muscles he'd forgotten he possessed screamed in protest as he double-timed it up and down companionways. The 'tween decks freight elevator was off limits unless actually shifting cargo. No problem obeying that edict. The rust-eaten raising and lowering cables looked ready to snap any minute. Chance's biceps and triceps turned to steel. Working topside in cut-offs and deck shoes turned his skin golden brown.

He grew a beard similar to Winston's, but fuller and shaped to a point - appropriately termed 'the anchor'. He let his hair grow long enough to plait and seal with tar like old-time seafarers did.

He discovered he enjoyed living at sea. Each port offered new sights, local cuisines as yet uncorrupted by the American style fast-food craze, dialects and melodies delightful to the ear. Always the smell of seawater and salt air.

The _Bitch_ seldom strayed beyond coastal waters. She bumbled her way from Miami as far as the Panama Canal, and sometimes joined the line-up going through the locks. Mostly she reversed course and returned to Miami, pausing along the way like a waterborne Santa Claus delivering presents to Mazatlan, Corpus Christi, Mobile or Gulf Port. From time to time she still tried to commit suicide, but less often once Chance and the First Mate convinced Captain Isaacson to retrofit her with some third- or fourth-hand radar equipment they bartered for with a few crates of rum.

The First Mate, a full-blood Navajo named Samuel Begay whose Code Talker father helped befuddle the Japanese army in World War Two, was delighted to find he'd hired something more than the typical boat-bum. Marty Gage - as Chance now called himself - followed orders, stood his watch, ate the unimaginative chow without complaint.

Crewmen came and went as regularly as the tides, but Chance stayed. Begay began rotating him in and out of various positions, helping him learn the ropes. Chance worked his way up from caulking portholes and swabbing the deck, to learning to read charts, to coping with the _Bitch_'s aging diesel engines' idiosyncrasies. Already familiar with Morse code, he often spelled the on-duty man in the radio shack.

When the purser jumped ship with over $2500 in cash, Chance and Begay tracked him down and recovered all but $57.00. Captain Isaacson handed Chance the purser's job permanently.

Little by little, Chance's anguished heart began to heal.

**… … … … …**

Although a few years younger than Chance, Begay seemed ancient in terms of life experience. He brooked no nonsense from the crew, never drank at sea, and sometimes gazed at the horizon as if he knew all about the alternate universes hidden beyond. At night the silver and turquoise charm he wore at this throat seemed to drink in light from the stars.

Chance found in Begay an easy-going shore companion, one hell of a barroom brawler, and bad enough at poker to fatten Chance's wallet a little more each time pay-day rolled around.

Late one afternoon, they stood at the railing, watching lightning flicker in a dark cloud mass. They were heading straight for it, along with another vessel approaching from abaft. An ocean liner, from its size.

The sea was already growing rough. The _Bitch _rolled and pitched, reared, and coming down hit the waves with a smack that vibrated from bow to stern. Attuned to her ways, Chance stood relaxed, one hand resting atop the rail, his calloused palm scarcely feeling the rusted pits and scars.

"Don't let this go to your head," Begay said, "but you're too damn good to be stuck on this tub. I'd hate like hell to lose you, but you should look for something better."

"A ship like that?" Chance jerked a thumb toward the liner slowly drawing abreast.

It was not yet the era of behemoth luxury liners towering more than sixteen decks high and boasting a passenger capacity larger than some cities. This one, with her seven decks, was still twice the size of _Sea Witch_.

Chance watched the liner approach, noting she gave them plenty of room. Didn't want to dirty her skirts, he thought wryly. Her knife-shaped prow cut cleanly through waves that tossed the _Bitch_ about like a toy. Her cream-colored sides and powder blue underbody glimmered and flashed in the last rays of the setting sun.

The upper decks with their striped awnings, the brassworks and railings, the painted-to-match lifeboats gleamed as if polished only minutes ago. Passengers on the promenade deck gazed down at the _Bitch_ and, Chance surmised, made disparaging remarks about the blotches staining her hull, the rusty tears dripping from her hawser holes. The _Bitch_ was no beauty queen.

"You could do worse," Begay said.

On the liner, portholes began to brighten. The portholes were huge, far larger than those on liners from Chance's era. Over the Bitch's growling diesels, the liner's PA system announced "First Seating." Passengers left the promenade deck. He remembered Princess Victoria in her sparkling blue dress - and out of it - and couldn't repress a smile.

The liner was pulling away. As she did, her portholes seemed to blend into rows of long lines etching the ship with light. Something large surfaced in her wake and snapped at a shard of color reflecting in the water. Shark? Chance wondered. Mermaid?

"Look who's talking," he said to Begay. "What's the matter, you scared I'm after your job?"

Much as he had impressed Sam Begay, Begay struck Chance as entirely too competent to waste his life on a third-rate vessel like the _Bitch_.

As if reading his thoughts, she pushed her nose under a wave that lifted her stern high enough to loft the propeller clear of the water. It rattled the entire ship before dropping, chugging and spluttering, into the sea.

"A few more like that and you can have it!"

Begay spent some time filling and lighting his pipe, then continued, "No, those sweetheart ships aren't for me. Their officers - if you can call 'em that - are mostly college boy draft dodgers or stockholders' sons who couldn't skipper a toy ship in a wading pond. Now a former pilot, maybe…. "

Although his prompt and facile grasp of how to read the ship's charts had prompted Chance to admit some knowledge of flying, no one ever questioned why he now chose the sea over air. Nor would he ever ask Begay what lured him so far from his homeland's deserts and mesas. To do so was a breach of etiquette as serious now as it was in Tombstone of 1881.

"You're a war hero's son," Chance said.

Begay spat over the rail. "That and a dime'll get a cup of coffee."

Just then, a fireball soared into the sky, dazzling their night vision. Another followed, then a third, white, green, orange. Not distress signals.

"God dammit!" Begay up-ended his pipe, tapping it on the rail to send an orange cascade of burning tobacco into the sea before shoving it into a pocket. "Whitey's broken into the cargo hold again."

The fireballs were shooting from a Roman Candle filched from a shipment bound for Rio de Janiero. Once the crew, always curious, discovered this particular treasure trove, they behaved like little boys raiding a fireworks kiosk, pilfering the shipment and setting off firecrackers, aiming bottle rockets at unsuspecting seagulls, and firing Roman Candle cannons at imaginary pirates at every opportunity.

"Let's go take 'em away before that liner spots 'em and thinks we're about to sink."

A hold full of fireworks was bad enough, but what worried Chance more were his suspicions they often carried serious contraband. The kind that would land them in some hell-hole prison. He held his breath whenever they were inspected. Somehow, perhaps through bribery, perhaps through subterfuge, or maybe just dumb luck, they always passed.

They were only a few miles outward bound from Galveston after one such inspection when their cargo finally granted the _Bitch_ her death wish.

The blast was ear-shattering. It killed three seamen instantly, including the radioman. The pillar of oily black smoke rising above the wreckage produced a cry for help more poignant than any SOS.

The _Sea Witch_ sank like a rock, carrying her dead with her.

They got the lifeboats in the water before she went down, with only one too damaged in the blast to launch. The others, properly maintained and provisioned, kept the 23 survivors afloat until rescue crafts arrived.

First on the scene, USCGC _Cahoone_, whose skipper's words of greeting were, "Well, well, I see she saved me the trouble of blowin' her to hell myself."


	10. Chapter 10

CHAPTER TEN  
Port Everglades, Florida  
1964

"Stick with me, Gage," Sam Begay told Chance when the cab he called arrived at the Galveston docks. "You'll find work soon. I'll foot the bills until you do."

The _Cahoone_'s crew, anticipating the survivors' plight, had passed the hat. Fellow merchant mariners ashore chipped in, too. The small fund would tide the _Witch_'s crew over for a time while they looked for work.

Chance took ten dollars. Begay took only enough to pay the cab fare. The other survivors needed it more.

Chance was grateful for Begay's kindness. Although he now possessed a letter from Captain Isaacson attesting to his identity, all his other belongings rested in Davy Jones' Locker. Ten dollars was all that stood between him and sleeping on a park bench. For Chance, being destitute was an eye-opener. He had never been utterly without home and hearth.

Begay had endured the experience before and taken steps to prevent it happening again. He kept a small checking account at Seamen's Bank in Galveston. The bank, accustomed to periodic visits by crewmen bereft of ship and papers, accepted the letter signed by Captain Isaacson and co-signed by the _Cahoone_'s skipper as sufficient documentation to access his account. They gave him a pad of temporary checks and a letter on bank stationery documenting his identity. In two or three weeks, he would receive a replacement Merchant Marine ticket. When it arrived, he could apply for work through the various shipping offices along the coast.

Chance surrendered five of his dollars to open an account, and he, too, got a letter of introduction from the bank. Chance hid a smile as he folded the letter. No demand for Social Security numbers or a birth certificate. Just one man's word to another. Incredible.

Next they stopped at a rooming house catering to seafarers, where they obtained a surprisingly clean room for a mere $3.00 a day each. Having obtained a roof over their heads, Begay and Chance collected donated clothing at a church community closet.

Although the rooming house did not provide meals, each room had a hot-plate. Until Chance found work washing dishes at a nearby diner, the men ate a lot of soup. The wages Chance earned were a joke, but they paid his share of the room rent. Furthermore, the cook encouraged him to take home the left-overs when she miscalculated the amount of mashed potatoes and pot roast or fried chicken needed for the day - something that happened quite regularly not long after Chance got the job.

The same day Begay's replacement ticket arrived, the landlady brought a telegram addressed to Begay. Begay read it, and uttered an authentic Navajo war whoop.

"Goddess Cruise Lines is hiring! Holy _frijoles_, half the _Cassiopeia_'s crew's hospitalized with some kind of bug. They're stuck in Port Everglades with a boat-load of pissed-off passengers. They can't leave port until they replace their incapacitated people. If we can get to Ft. Lauderdale in 24 hours, we've got jobs again."

"You forget, I don't have any papers. You'd better go, but what cruise ship would hire me?"

Begay laughed. "A desperate one. Don't worry, your letter from Captain Isaacson will get you a temporary berth. You may have to start as a deck-hand, but you'll work your way up in no time. C'mon! Grab your sea-bag and start packing!"

"Just how do you plan to get there in 24 hours?"

Begay stuck out a thumb in the traditional gesture of a hitchhiker.

"We'll never make it in time."

"You got any better ideas?"

At last Chance allowed himself to smile. "Actually, I do."

He pulled a Nestlé's Chocolate tin from under his bunk and gave it a shake, producing a muffled rattle. He had squirreled away every spare penny from his dish-washing job and any odd chores where he earned a dollar or two. When they counted the quarters, dimes, one-dollar bills and the occasional five, they had over $250.00

"Let's charter a plane."

* * *

Port Everglades, Florida, was established as a deep water harbor in 1927. By Chance's time, it formed the basis of a diverse maritime operation that included a growing containerized cargo business and a five-star cruise port.

In 1964, it had some serious growing to do.

They caught a bus on its single run from town to the harbor and followed a handful of other hopeful seamen to a Quonset hut squatting near the docks. Chance's first glimpse of the _Cassiopeia_ stopped him in his tracks.

She was about the size of the _Denali Damsel_, on which he'd posed as a passenger, escorting Princess Victoria to ransom her ne'er-do-well husband. Small by modern standards, the _Cassiopeia_ towered over the nascent port facilities, her prow as clean-cut as a clipper ship's, her livery a color scheme Chance had never seen - deep mulberry, pale aqua, and white.

"Uh-oh," Begay said, skidding to a stop beside Chance. "That doesn't look good."

"I think she's beautiful."

"Huh-uh," Begay said. "Don't you know purple is the very worst color you can paint a ship?"

This was a nautical superstition Chance had never heard. And obviously not everyone believed it. A brochure he'd spotted at the Miami airport extolled the fabulous adventures to experience in Florida, including a cruise to the Bahamas aboard either of the twin ships Califia and Cassiopeia. _A private bath in every cabin! Swimming all day, every day on our stunning 'lido' decks! Air conditioning!_ Some passengers were so taken with the ships' amenities, the brochure proclaimed, they chose to live on board all year round.

"She couldn't be any more unlucky than the Sea Witch," Chance said.

Shouldering his skimpy duffle, he headed for the Quonset hut. After a brief hesitation, Sam Begay followed.

Inside, voices droned like the hum of busy bees. White uniformed men and one or two women wearing crisp white blouses and deep mulberry skirts sat at a row of tables against the far wall. Behind them, taped to the wall, hand-lettered signs read STEWARD or ENGINEERING or some other job title. Lines were short. Some recruiters were closing down their tables.

"Looks like we're about the last applicants," Chance said.

"Yeah, but we're the best."

"I don't see any signs for deck hands."

"That would have filled up first thing," Begay said. "Go to ABLE BODIED. You'll qualify." He marched off toward the sign that read ENGINEERING.

Chance shrugged and headed across the room.

The officer manning the table for ABLE BODIED wore a tag reading 'Mr. Oglethorpe Cruise Director'. Chance wondered why a cruise director was screening seamen rather than stewards or entertainers or chess mavens.

Oglethorpe polished black horn-rim glasses with a linen pocket handkerchief monogrammed with an ornate 'O'. He took his time finishing the task, folded the kerchief just so, and replaced it in the correct pocket before acknowledging Chance's presence.

"We've almost reached our quota for Able Bodied," he said, giving Chance's hand-me-down clothing a disparaging once-over. He glanced at the documents on his table. 'No MM ticket, eh? Have you any proof you're what you claim to be?"

Chance resisted the urge to rap a sea-calloused finger on the documents. "Just what I gave you." _You arrogant SOB._

As Oglethorpe sniffed and reached for the documents, Chance added, "I was on the _Sea Witch_ when - "

"The hell you say!" for the first time, Oglethorpe looked at Chance, rather than past him. "Heard about that." He gave the bank document a cursory glance, but read the letter from Captain Isaacson in full. "Captain Isaacson speaks quite highly of you. Says here you were his purser. Why aren't you applying in that department?"

Chance shrugged. "Without an MM ticket?"

"Captain Isaacson's word is good enough for Goddess Cruises. Stand by one."

The man's tone had thawed, but Chance still thought he was an arrogant SOB.

Oglethorpe reached for a pad and removed a fountain pen from an inside pocket. He made a fastidious notation and tore off the page. He handed it and his documents to Chance. "Go down the line until you find the sign for SHIP'S OFFICERS. Give the lady this."

Oglethorpe had closed his table before Chance took three steps.

The woman at the SHIP'S OFFICERS table eyed Chance speculatively through rhinestone-studded cat's eye glasses. Her beehive hairdo looked like it could withstand gale force winds. Her name-tag read 'Hi! I'm Shirley!' and indicated neither marital status nor job title. Apparently, despite its name, Goddess Cruise Lines did not yet embrace the concept of women's lib.

Shirley glanced at Oglethorpe's note, skimmed the other papers, and gave Chance a dazzling smile.

"Martin Gage. Marty? Lost all your documents, hmmm? We'll help you get those replaced. We're not as strict about papers as Cunard or White Star. And we've been looking for a Purser's Assistant. That's a step down for you, but if you're as good as your recommendation says, I'm sure you'll be up for promotion in no time."

"Assistant suits me fine, Ma'am."

"Call me Shirley. Ever worked on a cruise ship?"

"No. Just freighters."

"You'll find things quite a bit different here. Dress code, for one thing. Hair. That queue will have to go. The beard, too, I'm afraid. Can't have you looking like a pirate, although I must say you'd make a very striking one."

Chance gave her his little boy grin. "Whatever you say, Shirley."

Shirley twiddled a pen as she looked him over. "Our goal is to make our voyages exciting and memorable for our passengers, many of whom are ladies traveling without male companions. To that end, we demand somewhat more from our officers than other cruise lines expect. You will dine with our guests and otherwise interact with them as much as possible. Our ladies expect our officers to be…attentive. Especially attractive, fit specimens like yourself. You will escort them on tours and attend our evening dances. You do dance, don't you, Marty?"

It was the last question Chance expected. No, he didn't dance, not if he could find any way to avoid it.

Thinking quickly, he said, "Um, not as good as my buddy over there applying at ENGINEERING does."

"Unfortunately, we do not permit our below decks crew to fraternize with guests. So brush up. I'll find someone to give you some refresher lessons. Do you play bridge?"

"I'm better at poker." This was not looking good. "Maybe I'd better go see if there's any deck hand jobs left."

Shirley rolled her eyes. "Sorry. I'm short on attractive men this trip, so you're elected. Maybe we can use you in the casino."

Anything but a damned dance floor, Chance thought.

She handed him a clipboard with several forms attached. "Fill these out. Take them to the end table. Show Mr. Mayhue in Ship's Stores your documents. Tell him you'll need to draw uniforms and some casual clothing against your first pay packet. Welcome, Marty, to the _Cassiopeia_."

Chance spotted Begay filling out forms and walked over to join him.

"I see you got hired," Begay said. "What's your rating?"

"They needed a Purser's Assistant."

Begay whistled. "Not bad. I told you, didn't I?"

"You didn't tell me I'd have to help entertain the ladies."

"Gee what a shame, having to entertain the ladies. I'll feel sorry for you all the time I'm greasing valves and hoping the boilers don't blow up in the middle of a hurricane."

"She didn't mean I'm supposed to…do more than…dance with them, did she?"

Begay stared at Chance. "What's wrong with you, Gage? You all of a sudden shy? These dames are mostly rich old gals with no one special in their lives, who only want a little attention to spice up their voyage. It's not like you gotta marry them! There's guys who'd kill for the opportunity. Hurry up and fill out your papers and we'll go find our quarters. And then see if we can scrounge something to eat. These passenger ships feed their crews pretty good."

With a sigh, Chance began to write.


	11. Chapter 11

CHAPTER ELEVEN  
aboard the _Cassiopeia_  
1964

When they walked onto the pier, they got their first close-up view of the _Cassiopeia_. Once again, Sam balked.

"Now what's wrong?" Chance asked.

"Look at that. They lengthened her. Cut her in half and welded in another thirty or so feet of ship. See those two lines of rivets? That's how they retro-fitted her lido deck."

"They made it longer in order to add height?"

"Don't ask me why. I don't build 'em, I just keep 'em running." Sam touched the silver and turquoise charm at his throat. "I hope," he muttered.

The crew gangway led to the post of a burley Master at Arms, who provided ship's security. The man glanced at their papers and motioned them on.

They emerged on Deck B, down the center of which ran a busy artery fore and aft. Crewmen and cruise staffers alike bustled along it like hyperactive ants. No iron deck slippery with grime here, no dunnage waiting in ambush for the unwary foot. No rust-riddled deckplates. In the warm Florida sun, the aromas of salt, engine oil, heated wood, scented the air. Unlike modern ships built of metals and plastics molded and finished to resemble wood, the _Cassiopeia_'s decks, rails and trim were genuine teak.

Chance and Sam found their way to Ship's Stores, where each drew clothing befitting their stations as _Cassiopeia_ personnel. Sam received dungarees and work shirts, Chance drew white 'camp' shirts with short sleeves, epaulets, and shiny brass buttons. White uniform shorts - they were sailing into the tropics. White trousers for formal occasions. Brand new underwear which, like his uniforms, would be collected regularly for laundering. What more could a man ask?

Their clothing necessities met, Chance and Sam split up to locate their quarters and make themselves presentable.

A passing steward showed Chance to his cabin. As Assistant Purser, he drew a very tiny cubicle, but one with the luxury of a private bathroom. The single bunk meant no roommate. He had a desk, a closet, and space for a foot-locker if he acquired one. A steward would change sheets, vacuum, bring clean towels and swab the bath once a week.

Best of all, the cabin had a porthole, although its tiny size gave him pause. Unlike the passenger cabin portholes - large enough to double as emergency escape hatches - a small child couldn't wriggle through his.

After a shower and donning clean off-duty 'civvies' retrieved from his duffle, Chance made straight for the crew barber shop. His severed queue hit the deck with a thud. His beard disappeared beneath a thick layer of Jade East scented shave cream and the skillfully applied strokes of a freshly honed straight-edge razor.

Assistant Purser, Chance learned when he reported for orientation, fell somewhere below the Senior Assistant Purser in rank. It meant he worked the graveyard shift, and any other duties the Cruise Director or the Chief Steward - either of whom could 'borrow' him - saw fit to assign. With the ship being short-handed, everyone performed double, even triple duty.

Reading over his assignment for the following week, Chance learned he was scheduled in the casino before his shift in the purser's office, to deal a few hands of poker. As dealer, he earned a per-centage of every pot, win or lose.

Which, he concluded, left little time when he could be coerced into dancing, or assigned escort service for shore excursions.

It was approaching 1800 hours when Chance entered the crew's mess and spotted Sam Begay carrying a plate with two slices of cherry pie and a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

"You leave any for me?" Chance asked.

"Only what I couldn't carry."

Chance filled his plate with pot-roast, vegetables, dinner rolls and applesauce. He rejoined Sam, who had already demolished his first piece of pie and started on his second.

"We need to learn our way around," Sam said. "Have you been to your muster station yet?"

"Nope. They had lifeboat drill the day they left Miami, before everyone got sick. I'm somewhere on the Lido Deck, but I report to the Purser's Office first, in case my seniors can't get there."

"We'll go find it after we eat." Sam got up to fetch more pie.

After spending most of the afternoon going over official procedures, duties, and responsibilities, Chance was far from eager to spend potential 'rack time' exploring the ship. Sam insisted.

"You need to know this stuff. People's lives might depend on it."

Sam had been busy garnering as much scuttlebutt as possible. Since Chance refused to budge until he finished his own pie _a la mode_, while Chance ate, Sam passed along what he'd learned.

In an atrocious burr nowhere close to mimicking the boiler room engineer's Scottish accent, Sam said, "She's a grand old lady wi' a bit o' a checkered past." He resumed his normal voice. "They brag she has the latest innovations but those were all added in the past year or so. She's a lot older than anyone's admitting."

The _Cass_, Sam lectured, was fifteen years past her maiden voyage when she helped ferry soldiers home from World War Two's Pacific theater, later from Korea. She ran aground more than once, suffered two mid-sea collisions, and one of her captains committed suicide. Or might have been pushed overboard. Names and initials of soldiers scarred her bulkheads and combat boots gouged her decks. After those torturous years, she needed a thorough refit and refinishing. The owners decided to lengthen her and add the newest craze, a "lido" or 'beach" deck while they were at it.

"No one I've talked to knows much more," Sam said. "Most of the crew's been here only a year or two, or are temporaries. And the captain just took command about six months ago. Want to know something really strange?"

Chance didn't, but Sam plowed on. "Oglethorpe, the Cruise Director? He used to be papered. Had his own ship - the _Califia_, the _Cass_'s sister ship."

Chance paused with a bite of pie half-way to his mouth. "What happened with that?"

"No one knows, or else they're not talking."

When Chance finally pushed himself away from the table, they found a companionway to the Restaurant Deck with its galley and pantries and two elegant dining rooms, the Phobos Grill and Planet Deimos. An enormous ballroom and lounge between the restaurants took up most of the deck. Above, on A-Deck, they found smoking rooms, the writing room, library and passenger cabins.

The passenger decks looked clean and smelled clean, and the passengers they failed to avoid sounded well lubricated and delighted to be underway again. But the fresh paint smell worried Sam. Once, peeking into a supply closet, they found a pile of oily rags dumped in a cardboard box flush against a hot steam-pipe.

Sam swore as he scooted the box over with his foot. "You wouldn't believe below decks. Exposed wiring, leaking oil piping. Butts on the floor. MacDonald keeps the boiler room neat as a pin, but the rest is a disaster waiting to happen. If there's a fire-door anywhere, I haven't seen one."

Chance had noticed a lack of overhead sprinklers, too, but assumed they were things of the future. Coiled fire hoses behind glass doors were as specified in the _Regulations Book_ he was instructed to study.

"What about fire alarm call-boxes?"

Sam looked puzzled. "You mean like in school buildings or hospitals?"

Oops, those must not have been instituted yet, either, Chance thought. "Uh, yeah. Those."

"In your dreams, buddy. Be glad there's a few extinguishers where we can lay hands on them."

They forged on, through the Main Deck with the passengers' gangway, Master-at-Arms office, purser's office and the best guest suites, then the Promenade Deck, aglow with light from the Moonbeams Lounge and the Starlight Bar. The casino and Penumbra Taproom, tucked into a nook on the Lido Deck showed little activity.

They finally reached the Boat Deck where lifeboats and motorized skiffs were stored. Now Sam produced a flashlight and shone the beam on the first lifeboat winch.

"Look there!"

Paint covered the winch, as well as the cables to lower the boat. It looked like several coats had been layered on, one after the other. Even the _Sea Witch _had looked better cared for.

"Are they all like that? How in hell did this tub ever pass a safety inspection?" Chance said.

Sam snorted. "Same as the _Bitch_." He rubbed thumb and fingers together, signifying payoff. "I'll tell Chief MacDonald. Chances are he won't like it, coming from a new hand, but maybe he'll get someone on it. If we ever have to use these, you'd need a fire axe to break through those layers."

* * *

Chance had lived ashore long enough he needed to reacquire his sea-legs. The _Cass_ didn't pitch and yaw as the _Sea Witch_ had, or perhaps the warm blue waters of the Caribbean didn't develop sufficient chop to roughen the ride. After a day or two, he felt right at home.

The Purser's Office drew a surprising amount of traffic after 2300 hours, with passengers cashing in casino chips or withdrawing funds to pay their losses. After 0100 hours, business trickled off, and he applied himself to various accounting tasks. With computerized bookkeeping systems a thing of the distant future, every transaction was entered by hand in different logs. Chance was handed a shirt pocket-size, battery powered calculator and told to guard this little wonder with his life. His other tasks were equally stultifying. Chance began to yearn for something more challenging. Like parachuting onto the roof of a sky-scraper. Wild car chases. Snatching a kidnap victim from under the noses of the Russian Mafia. He began to think about returning to his own time.

Now there's a challenging assignment, he mused as he reviewed bills of lading from their last port of call. When the ship returned to Miami, he'd try to contact Mistress Kassandra. At least she'd know he wasn't a madman hallucinating a life in the 21st century. If she couldn't help, or refused to, what then?

He considered the Christopher Chance he designated Reno-78. Was it himself, unable to return to his own time, practicing his new/old trade? If it was someone else, could he use a partner? The idea struck him as do-able. Nevada was an organized crime Mecca in the 1960s. Lots of people needed protection. Maybe Sam would join him. The idea sounded better and better.

His decision was set the evening Cruise Director Oglethorpe discovered how unattended the poker table was. Overnight a bingo parlor replaced the green felt. Chance was ordered to join the other 'gentlemen hosts' detailed to entertain single ladies. He managed to duck afternoon tea and sessions of Mah-jongg by offering to run the skeet-shooting competitions and teach a ladies' self-defense class.

"Ladies' self-defense, hmmm. That's an interesting concept," Oglethorpe said. "We'll give it a try. But nothing short of a broken leg," he added with a sadistic smile, "will excuse you from after-dinner dance duty."

Chance wondered if a few 'accidental' shotgun pellets through the calf would qualify.

When Millicent Tuttle, one of the traveling single ladies, elbowed her way to the front of the line to sign up for the self-defense classes, Chance considered upping the shotgun wound from 'accidental' to a deliberate, suicidal head-shot. In her early fifties, plump beyond the bounds of 'pleasingly', possessing a wicked elbow to the ribs to punctuate each and every stale joke, Millicent Tuttle searched him out whenever he put in a reluctant appearance in his dress whites.

Her screeching laugh grated on Chance's ears. She was a worse dancer than he was, but twice as determined, and not the least bit shy about demanding turn after turn about the floor. She wheedled Oglethorpe into seating Chance at her table for dinner, and insisted "that nice Mr. Gage" escort her and two or three companions whenever there was an excursion ashore.

She evinced an unhealthy attachment to her parasol, a huge, mottled sunshade, and brought it everywhere they went. The damn thing weighed a ton. Chance inevitably wound up carrying it, scrunched in the center of at least three gabbling women all trying to keep in the shade. He began wearing his athletic cup from self-defense class on shore excursions.

More than once Chance considered using the EAD Julia had draped around his neck in Dallas. Even a mere ten minutes of invisibility would be wonderful when 'Call-me-Millie-you-sweetheart-you' Tuttle started one of her long-winded, elbow-punctuated anecdotes.

Well, you wanted a challenge, Chance reminded himself as he hoisted Millie's parasol for yet another stroll to the next souvenir shop.

But this wasn't what he had in mind.


	12. Chapter 12

CHAPTER 12  
aboard the _Cassiopeia_  
1964

It was their last night at sea. A sea growing rough with odd flurries of rollers that lifted the _Cass_ and let her fall with less than her customary grace. Slipped away only to sneak back and slam against the hull with enough force to jolt unsuspecting passengers and make her welded seams groan. The unpredictable roughness sent many passengers to their cabins early despite a full slate of activities planned to celebrate tomorrow's landfall and the end of another delightful Caribbean cruise.

Chance breathed a sigh of relief when he didn't spot Millicent Tuttle among those who, unintimidated by rising seas, enjoyed their last formal dinner in Planet Deimos, nor lurking in ambush in the ballroom. He watched passengers dropping by to say farewell to Captain Larsen and thank him for a truly pleasant voyage. Those who wished to also thank Cruise Director Oglethorpe were disappointed. He was nowhere to be seen.

Chance allowed himself to enjoy a brief mental image of Oglethorpe button-holed by Millie, enduring a thoroughly disgusting improper demand the cruise director couldn't find any reasonable excuse to refuse.

In fact, Hubert Oglethorpe was happily using his pass-key to open the gun-safe in the Purser's Office. He took from it one of the Browning autoloader shotguns used for skeet competitions. He loaded it, then filled his pockets with spare ammunition. The extra weight ruined the lines of his tailored uniform, but that couldn't be helped. He expected some resistance to his own end-of-cruise spectacular. He needed the means to deal with it.

No one other than Oglethorpe knew they had entered the Bermuda Triangle. Even in the 1960s, cruise ships avoided this perilous and mysterious region. Bounded roughly by the island of Bermuda, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Miami, the Triangle possessed long grasping fingers that snatched up ships and planes tiptoeing along her outskirts as readily as those which brazenly invaded her innermost reaches. Bermuda-bound ships left from New York to avoid joining the unwary vessels swallowed up by the Triangle and never seen again.

The _Cassiopeia_'s itinerary kept her beyond this danger zone until a few minute adjustments to the navigation equipment altered her course just enough to nudge her into the southernmost edge as they steamed toward Miami.

When the Triangle could not entrammel passing crafts, it settled for confounding men's minds. Not his, of course, the Cruise Director assured himself. His thoughts could not be more lucid, his intentions more fitting. Oglethorpe knew their position. Just as he knew many other things no one expected a Cruise Director to know. He might have lost his Master's papers over some ridiculous charge any rational board of inquiry would have dismissed on the first reading, but not his ability to command a ship.

"Cruise Director my ass," he muttered. A sop his Chairwoman of the Board mother-in-law had thrown his way to insure her precious daughter continued her extravagant life-style without a husband in port to impinge on her activities.

He knew all the _Cassiopeia_'s ins and outs. Not that he dared risk trespassing below decks. The engineer and boiler room chief didn't tolerate passenger staff intruding into their territory. But he knew many ways to injure a ship. Especially one which suffered the neglect this one had. She was a fine ship to go down with. Smiling a pleasant smile, Oglethorpe took a book of matches from his pocket, lit one, and used it to set the others aflame before nestling the mini-torch into a pile of oily rags. Closing the closet door, he moved on to his next target.

**… … … … …**

Captain Larsen had departed for a last circuit of the upper decks before turning in for the night. The other officers left shortly thereafter. The orchestra was playing "Good Night, Ladies". As Chance escorted his final dance partner back to her table, a stairwell door burst open with a crash. A man staggered through, screaming. He collapsed on the ballroom floor. His clothing was aflame, his hair smoking stubble.

Chance dashed across the floor, seizing a lead crystal water pitcher from a table as he passed. He dumped the contents onto the man's head and shoulders. Two quick-thinking stewards were right behind him with more water, another snatched a tablecloth to help smother the flames. The injured man moaned and plucked weakly at his charred clothing. The odor of burned flesh rose in a nauseating cloud.

As someone slammed the stairwell door, Chance caught a glimpse of dancing orange. Wherever the man had run from, he'd left a trail of fires burning in his wake.

No fire alarm sounded. The horn summoning passengers to their muster stations remained ominously silent. Looking around, Chance saw that people had gathered in a loose circle around himself, the stewards, and the man on the floor, waiting for someone to say what to do.

That would be me, Chance thought with a sigh. I'm the closest guy with brass buttons on his uniform.

"You," he said, pointing at one of the stewards, "call a medic. Where's the nearest fire alarm signal?" he asked the other.

"Just the one on the bridge, Sir."

Wonderful. "Find the captain. Tell him there's a fire. Tell any other officer you meet."

Although he spoke quietly, he heard gasps and exclamations from the people nearest him, urgent murmurings from those farther away.

"If you don't find Larsen before you get to the bridge, you sound the alarm yourself," he instructed. "Never mind chain of command. Go." The steward tossed Chance a salute and hurried off.

Chance headed for an alcove housing a ship's telephone, brushing past worried passengers and ignoring questions. He dialed the 3-digit number for the engine room, hoping Sam would pick up. No such luck, the voice that answered spoke in Italian. After a startled moment, Chance replied in kind.

"Rouse the chief engineer. The ship's on fire."

He hung up the phone and addressed the passengers.

"Okay, people, listen please. Don't wait for the alarms to sound. I don't know why they haven't. Go to your muster stations. Wait there for someone to tell you what to do next."

The _Reg's_ book said in the event of a fire, crew would be standing by to load passengers into lifeboats. He only hoped without the alarms sounding, someone was. As people started moving off, he saw stewards struggling with firehoses, not waiting for the alarm or crewmen trained to fight fire. Where the hell was the captain? Why wasn't he on the PA, issuing orders, sounding the alarms, reassuring the passengers?

"Shit, Gage," Sam Begay said from behind him, "the whole ship's on fire. Every deck I came through has smoke or open fires."

He carried a fire extinguisher, which he tossed aside, empty. His denim shirt bore dozens of burn-holes where embers had fallen on it. His face dripped sweat mixed with smoke-grime.

"_Every_ deck? Sam, that's no accidental blaze. Someone started those fires."

"I told you purple was unlucky."

"We need to get these people into lifeboats. Let's head for the bridge, find out what's going on."

The men set off at a run.

"Christ," Chance blurted when they reached the Boat Deck.

Some of the boats were burning in their davits. No one was fighting the flames. Still no fire alarm. No muster signal. The ship's public address system remained ominously silent.

When they burst into the wheel-house, the sight meeting their eyes more closely resembled a charnel house than a cruise ship.

Four men in red-splotched white uniforms lay crumpled on the deck - helmsman, radio-man, the captain and the steward Chance had sent to find him. At the wheel stood Oglethorpe. He wore Captain Larsen's too-large cap atilt over one eye. One of the skeet Brownings rested in the crook of his arm.

He greeted them with a broad, welcoming smile. Chance saw in an instant Oglethorpe was no longer sane.

"Gentlemen, how delightful of you to join me." He brought the shotgun up, letting go of the wheel as he did. the ship swayed and Oglethorpe pressed his thigh against the wheel to hold it steady.

Play to his mania, Chance thought. Lull him, then jump him. He glanced at Sam, who nodded.

"Captain," Chance said, "your ship is in danger. There's a massive fire - "

"Of course there's a fire," Oglethorpe said in an eerily calm voice. "I set it. It's _my _ship. I'll burn it to the waterline if I choose to."

"Your passengers are in danger. Let me sound the alarm…."

Oglethorpe's voice cracked like a whip. "No one leaves the ship."

Chance was reaching for the red alarm button when Oglethorpe thumbed back the shotgun's hammer. As he did, Sam dove for Oglethorpe's legs. Chance went high, grabbing the shotgun. He wrenched it free and swung it at Oglethorpe's temple. At that moment the ship lurched wildly, flinging Oglethorpe's head up just as the shotgun stock connected. Chance heard a sickening crunch. He knew without having to check for a pulse the man was dead when he hit the deck.

"Not your fault," Sam said when Chance didn't move. Sam scrambled to his feet and grabbed Chance's arm. "C'mon, buddy, we gotta get things moving."

Chance shook off his stupor. There was no time to worry about blame. He hit the fire alarm button. Sam sounded the Muster Station signal on the ship's horn.

"I'll take the wheel," Sam said. He reached for the ship's telegraph to signal the engine room 'all stop'. "Go see if you can save the lifeboats."

Chance wrenched a portable fire extinguisher from its clips and ran.

Choking from the eddying smoke, Chance aimed the extinguisher at the nearest lifeboats. The chemical spray proved useless against the terrible heat. Just as the canister sputtered its last, he heard shouts. Crewmen dragging firehoses took over the battle. Moments later the _Cass_ ceased her forward motion and turned her prow into the wind, blowing the ever-increasing clouds of smoke away from the ship.

He returned to the bridge, where Sam was pushing a white-uniformed young man toward the wheel. "Keep her steady as she goes," he said. Sam bent to drag one of the corpses away so the appalled junior officer didn't trip over it. Chance helped move the others.

"What next?" he asked.

"Man the radio. Make sure someone's heard our SOS. If not, keep sending 'til someone replies. I'm going to make sure our passengers are evacuating, rouse any still in their cabins - I only see a few on the promenade. If someone relieves you, you do the same. Meet me back here in an hour."

"An hour?"

Sam grinned without humor. "It'll seem like five minutes."

**… … … … …**

In her cabin, Millicent Tuttle awoke to the distinct odor of smoke. Dread swept over her. She considered herself one gutsy broad, but her fear of fire was as much a genetic trait as blue eyes or big feet. She had never been able to overcome it.

So far, the fire alarm hadn't sounded. That was encouraging. Reluctantly she rolled onto her side and eased her bulky body from the bunk. She hated her flab and longed for the girlish - if buxom - figure she possessed such a short time ago. Once this voyage was over, she'd -

The ship gave an unusually strong lurch, jolting her from her ruminations. Moments later both the fire alarm and the Report to Muster signals sounded. But so faintly. If she had been asleep, she wouldn't have heard them. She hadn't slept well since coming aboard. She knew a jinxed ship when she saw one. The _Cassiopeia_ radiated doom. Anyone as perceptive as she to ill omens could sense it.

A muffled _whump_, like a gas burner igniting, followed by running feet and pounding on doors, sent her scurrying for clothing suitable for abandoning ship.

She ran a soothing hand across her parasol's silken folds. Her good luck charm, her talisman. Her beloved companion wherever she went. She'd wait until the last possible moment to evacuate. Otherwise, someone would snatch it from her and toss it into the sea. The poor thing would float, of course, but it was silly to risk losing it for even a short while.

More pounding and yelling. Millicent struggled into a pink polyester jumpsuit everyone said made her look positively svelte. Then she heard the lock on her cabin door click as someone used a key. She squeezed into the closet as a steward poked his head in.

"Hallo! Anyone here? To your muster station if you please. Anyone here?"

After a brief glance around, the steward trotted off to rouse more passengers. Millicent quietly closed the door and relocked it.


	13. Chapter 13

CHAPTER 13  
the Bermuda Triangle  
1964

Throughout the ship, the odor of smoke alerted passengers something was amiss. Seasoned travelers did not wait for alarm bells or signals to begin evacuating. With only two elevators, most chose the stairways. The problem was, as many were trying to go below to retrieve life-vests from their cabins as were heading for the upper decks.

Shouting, Chance urged those going down to go topside instead. "There's spare life-vests on the promenade!" He hoped the fire hadn't gotten to them and someone was passing them out.

A few listened, but not until great gouts of smoke and relentless flame filled the passageways did the most stubborn follow those already moving toward their muster stations.

When those making for the upper decks were mostly crew herding along a few straggling passengers, Chance glanced at his watch. He was already ten minutes late meeting Sam.

When he reached the promenade deck, he couldn't believe the chaos.

"They can't lower the boats," someone shouted. "We're all going to die!"

Idiot, Chance thought, but the man was partly right. Many of the lifeboats had burned. Those that didn't were stuck in their davits.

Various crew were trying to form the passengers into manageable groups. Without boats to put them into, the groups disintegrated as rapidly as they formed. People milled in a great seething mass.

"Stay calm," he yelled. "No one's gonna die!"

Two motorized skiffs were in the water, crewmen at the tillers, waiting to load. Six or eight inflatables floated nearby, but people had to be lowered in a boson's chair or climb down cargo nets to reach them. Only a few had risked it. They needed the remaining lifeboats.

He saw Sam swing an axe at one of the davits. Recalling what Sam said about the painted-over cable, Chance looked about for an axe of his own. One fire-fighter surrendered his, then grabbed a companion's arm and followed Chance to the boat deck where they began helping chop the cables free. As the boats came down, crewmen hustled people into them.

Chance nudged Sam as six or eight crewmen from below decks pushed past waiting passengers, scrambled into a boat designed to hold thirty, and released it. With no more than a half dozen passengers aboard, the crew rowed off.

"Can't have that," he said. "C'mon."

Leaving the firemen to free the stuck cables, Chance and Sam rode the next boat to the promenade deck. Each armed with a belaying pin, they cordoned off the boat until enough passengers had boarded, then beckoned four crewmen forward to row. As more boats lowered, other crewmen took up posts to insure only enough crew to row or the injured boarded with the passengers.

Before long, ships responding to Chance's SOS were hailing the Cassiopeia and sending their own boats to collect passengers.

* * *

The _Cass_ was blazing amidships with considerable energy and beginning to list to port. Anyone trapped in a cabin had probably perished, overcome by smoke or flames. Chance and Sam had done all they could. Time to get the hell out of Dodge.

They decided to make one last circuit before the list grew too steep for walking. They were on the opposite side of the ship from the rescue operations when Chance heard the cries.

"Help me! Please…someone, help!"

Millicent Tuttle's voice carried above the crackling flames like a jet overflying a playground. Chance would recognize the screech anywhere. Of all the passengers on this ship, why _her_? For a moment he would always be ashamed of, he considered pretending he hadn't heard her.

She'd be okay in the water for a while, he told himself. Someone would pick her up. He'd send someone to get her.

His feet refused to budge. What if she couldn't swim?

He snagged one of several flotation rings hanging in a row on hooks, and peered over the side, ready to toss her the ring. She wasn't in the water.

Fifteen feet below, Millicent Tuttle's upper half protruded from a cabin porthole.

She stretched her flabby arms upward. "Help me! The cabin's burning. My legs!"

"Go back in," Chance shouted. "Wet down a blanket and cover up with it until I get there."

"I can't!" She pushed herself out another inch or two. "I'm stuck!"

Sam had run for several seconds before realizing Chance wasn't beside him. He came pounding back. "C''mon, man. This tub could turn turtle any minute!"

"Passenger's stuck," Chance said.

Sam peered over the side. "Gee-sus, Gage, why'd she do that?"

Chance was uncoiling the line attached to the flotation ring. "I'm going down. Maybe I can push her back in."

He hadn't performed a Dulfer rappel - no harness, no carabineers, no brakes - since he was in his teens. He had vowed never to do so again. Friction burns were the least damage he could hope for. Now, unless he suddenly sprouted wings, he had no choice.

"Are you crazy?"

"Probably."

Chance made sure the line was secure, then tossed the ring into the water. With his back to the rail, he straddled the line, grabbed a length and snugged it under one hip, draped it across his chest, over the opposite shoulder and down his back. He winced as the line bit into his crotch.

"Gimme your shirt - quick."

Sam took a moment to process words he could never have anticipated, then 'got it' and peeled his shirt off. Chance swiftly folded it and stuffed it into the front of his pants.

"Wish me luck," he said. Cautiously Chance let himself over the side.

The moment his legs came within clutching range, Millicent's flailing arms clamped on and clung like an amorous anaconda.

"Pull me out," she shrieked. "Hurry!"

"You have to let go," Chance shouted, fighting to maintain the wrap. "I can't help you from here."

He worked one leg free and pushed against the hull until he pried himself free of her stranglehold. Before she grabbed him again, he paid out another two feet of line.

This time Millicent's arms locked around his neck. "Please get me out of here! The fire - My broom!"

Broom? No, she didn't say that. Half deaf from bull-horns blasting instructions and the flames roaring from the upper decks, with Millicent's choke-hold cutting off oxygen to his brain, she could have said anything.

"Dammit, Millicent, Let. Go."

She clutched him even tighter. Putting what little seductive persuasion he still possessed into his voice, he tried again.

"Millie, it's me. Marty Gage. Listen. You have to do what I say. Do you trust me?"

Her arms loosened a fraction. "Y-yes."

He sucked in a desperate gulp of air.

"That's my girl. Let go. You won't fall. Can you pull yourself back in?"

"No! I tried. It's so hot, Mr. Gage."

"I know. We'll figure something."

He had to pull her the rest of the way out. To do that, he had to make the porthole larger, or Millicent smaller. He didn't think the porthole would cooperate.

"Okay. When I tell you, I want you to exhale as hard as you can and don't breathe in. That'll compress your ribs. I'm gonna wrap my arms around you and pull. You may get scraped some, but there's no other way. When I pull, push as hard as you can. Ready?"

She nodded.

He tucked the rope under his chin and prayed the ship didn't take that moment to roll. Swiftly he wrapped both arms around Millicent, locking his fingers together under her pillowy bosom.

"Now."

Millicent exhaled. Chance braced his feet, released the rope and yanked with all his strength.

He didn't expect it to work, but it did. Millicent popped from the porthole as if she'd suddenly lost twenty pounds. The rope fell away, letting Chance's thrust propel them several feet away from the ship.

They hit the water with an almighty double splash. When Chance surfaced, he found himself face to face with a surprisingly buoyant Julia Hastings.

"Christopher! Thank the Goddess!"

"Julia?" He was seeing things.

"It's me! But where's Cedric? Didn't he follow us?" She looked around wildly, searching the water around them for something.

"Cedric?"

He realized he sounded like an echo chamber, but Chance was still coming to grips with Julia masquerading as Millicent Tuttle. That damned parasol she insisted on carrying everywhere they went must be Cedric in disguise.

Treading water, Chance said, "I didn't see it. C'mon, we've gotta swim for it. This hulk's gonna sink or blow up any minute and take us with it."

"I can't just leave Cedric. Christopher, he'll…_burn_."

He heard sincere terror in her voice. Witches feared few things more than fire. Probably brooms even more so. He looked up, way, way up, where smoke billowed from the porthole to Julia's cabin. One deck higher, Sam was yelling something Chance couldn't hear. He looked at Julia, saw tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Oh, hell."

Chance grabbed the life-ring floating nearby, found the attached rope and began pulling himself toward the ship. After a moment he felt a powerful tug. Sam, shaking his head 'no' and freeing one hand to twirl a forefinger at his temple to signify Chance had completely lost his mind, began hauling him in.

When he reached the ship, the list was enough that using the rope, he could walk up the hull. When he reached Julia's porthole, he peered in. Couldn't see a thing through the smoke filling the cabin. Heat threatened to broil him.

"Cedric!" Nothing. He turned back for one last gulp of good air, then wriggled in.

He felt moisture being sucked from his wet clothing. He dropped to his belly on the tilted floor, coughing and groping for anything that felt like a broom or an umbrella or a hoof. He didn't know what he'd do if Cedric had morphed into his equine shape. Was the damned thing hiding? Shut in a closet?

"Cedric!" he croaked.

He couldn't get enough air into his lungs to shout. Heat rising from the burning deck below scorched his hands and knees. He thanked God for Sam's shirt, an extra layer of protection between a certain vital portion of his anatomy and the smoldering carpet. Another few seconds and he'd have to retreat -

His reaching fingers brushed something on the floor, a dress, or - Millicent's parasol. Cedric.

"Move you slab-sided, contrary, jug-eared piece of coyote bait!"

He'd heard a teamster in Tombstone use a similar phrase on a recalcitrant mule team to very satisfactory results. Cedric lay inert. Unconscious. Or dead.

Fingers locked into the fabric of the parasol/broom, he back-crawled to the porthole. With the last of his strength he heaved Cedric through and floundered after it just as the cabin roof collapsed with a shower of flaming embers.


	14. Chapter 14

CHAPTER14  
the Bermuda Triangle  
1964

Chance jumped as far out as he could. This time his dive was clean. When he surfaced, there was Julia, bobbing like a cork and clinging to an oversized oar that must be Cedric.

Above them, Sam Begay cupped both hands around his mouth. "You two okay down there?"

If he noticed the drastic change in 'Millicent', or that she was riding on the water's surface rather than swimming in it, Sam uttered not a word.

Chance waved a hand. "Just peachy."

"Don't go away. I'll be right back with a boat." Sam trotted off, heading for the opposite side of the ship.

He draped an arm over Cedric, letting the oar/broom support him in the water. "Julia," he said, "we've gotta get out of here. I…killed a man. It was an accident, but - "

"Oh, you're right. You mustn't be brought to trial. Even an acquittal would generate too much publicity."

"Can Cedric fly us?"

Julia stroked Cedric's glossy wooden neck. "I don't think so. He's terribly weak. All that smoke and heat almost killed him. Besides, someone might see us."

While rescue operations were focused on the opposite side of the ship, spotlights from helicopters and rescue vessels swept the waters on both sides, searching for missed survivors. Someone could spot them any minute. Sam would come to retrieve them as soon as he commandeered a boat.

"Can't you just cast another 'ignore me' spell?"

She shook her head, producing a spray of water droplets. "He'd need all my powers amplifying his to fly. Especially carrying two. I can't hide us and help him - why are you grinning?"

Chance tugged the EAD free of his shirt and held it above the water. "Because I've still got this. Right over there is an empty inflatable. Do you think Cedric can push it?"

"Christopher! You are amazing! Cedric, dear, do you think you can change again? We need a dolphin."

Chance had an Evinrude outboard motor, maybe 40 horsepower, in mind, but wasn't going to quibble.

Cedric abruptly sank, yanking Chance spluttering beneath the surface before he could let go. A moment later, with a swirl and a splash, a huge bottle-nose dolphin appeared, a large fish struggling desperately in its jaws. The dolphin - Cedric - gulped down the fish, then disappeared, only to re-emerge, carrying the flotation ring like a dog carries a Frisbee.

Julia closed her eyes, squinched up her face, and chanted a string of syllables. As if propelled by a gust of wind, or hundreds of little duck feet, the inflatable skittered over the water to them. Cedric swam in circles, flipping the flotation ring into the air and catching it again.

"Looks like he's recovered," Chance said, sounding a little sulky.

He cut a length of the flotation ring's rope for a tow-line and secured it to the inflatable. With Cedric tugging impatiently at the ring, now over his head like a horse-collar, Chance boosted Julia in and clambered in after her. Julia glanced past his shoulder.

"Here comes your friend. Use the device."

"Wait. Even if we're gone, won't he remember seeing us in the water? Wonder where we went?"

"No, the amnesia's retroactive. He'll lose about ten minutes. Forget why he's here. Maybe think he saw someone, but he won't remember who. Now hurry!"

Chance squeezed the device. Julia cried, "Go, Cedric!" The inflatable took off through the water with a jerk that almost sent Chance sprawling overboard.

A dozen yards away, Sam Begay idled his rescue boat's motor. One hand rested on the charm he wore at his throat as he watched 'Marty Gage' and the hot little red-head go zipping across the waves, towed by a dolphin.

"Good luck, my friend," he said, "wherever you're bound."

Sam had told Chance about his Code Talker father. He hadn't had occasion to mention that his mother, her mother, and for as many generations back as the Dineh walked this land, their mothers before them had watched over the Navajo, curing their ills and healing their minds.

As he released the charm, a talisman against spells and skinwalkers, Gage and his red-haired woman blinked out of sight.

**… … … … …**

Records would show eleven passengers and eight crew lost in the Cassiopeia disaster, including passenger Millicent Tuttle, whose body was not recovered. Among the crew, three officers and a steward shot by the deranged crew director, Hubert Oglethorpe, and Oglethorpe himself from a skull-fracture of undetermined cause. Also missing, his body presumed consumed by fire, Assistant Purser Martin Gage.

"He was a hero," Sam Begay told a reporter from _Life Magazine_ waiting on the dock for the rescue ships. "Many of the crew were new and not very experienced. Gage led the way, getting lifeboats over the side and passengers into them. Just when we thought everyone was off, we heard someone yelling for help. A lady was stuck in her cabin porthole.

"He got her out and they were in the water, safe. Then he went back - I guess someone else was still in the cabin. He never came out. I looked for him and that woman he saved, but I never saw them again. Me an' Gage, we were pretty lucky to survive when the _Sea Witch _blew up. I guess Gage's luck got used up on this one."

**… … … … …**

About the same time Sam was giving his interview, Chance and Julia came ashore on a tiny islet a few miles from Cat Island to let their clothing dry and give Cedric a chance to rest and graze. Julia set a pile of driftwood ablaze with Witchfire, the green flame invisible beyond a dozen feet, then strolled into the trees. She emerged a short while later carrying a palm frond basket filled with figs and mangos.

Chance gave her the eye. "So, tell me, my little witchling, why didn't you melt when you hit the water?"

She put her hands on her hips and glared. "Honestly, Christopher. That only happens in Oz."

She had transformed Millicent's pink polyester jumpsuit into a flowered silk sarong that was giving Chance all sorts of ideas. Before he could decide which one to suggest first, Julia spoke again.

"Why do you think in olden days they tied women up and threw us into ponds? If we drowned, oops, big mistake, we weren't witches. If we floated, they knew we were." She looked sad, as if recalling an unpleasant memory. "Then they pulled us out and burned us. That's why I got stuck in the porthole. I was so frightened I forgot the counterspell I needed to change back. Until you came to my rescue."

She batted her eyes at him. He scowled.

"What the hell were you doing, pretending to be Millicent Tuttle? I was ready to jump ship to get away from her."

"I was instructed to keep an eye on you. If you didn't decide to come home, I was supposed to convince you."

He gave an exaggerated shudder. "Another 24 hours of Millie would have done it. Do you have any idea how heavy Cedric is? And what's with that voice? I've heard rusty hinges sound better."

Julia preened. "Pretty awful, wasn't it? So…are you ready to come home?"

"I am."

He was. He might never obtain absolution for all the lives he'd taken, but when he thought of how many he helped save on this voyage, he felt good about himself. Damn good.

"So, how do we get there? Is Cedric recovered enough to fly?" He'd never admit it, but he was beginning to enjoy flying broom-back.

"I'm sure he will be soon, but we'll stay here until tomorrow night. This is the Bermuda Triangle, after all. We can catch a moonbeam home."

"Julia?"

"Yes, Christopher?"

"When are the next nude midnight revels?"

* * *

EPILOG  
the land of the Fae

November 24, 1963

_AUTHOR'S NOTE: If you skipped over the Prolog, you might want to go back and read it before reading the Epilog._

Jack Kennedy, Halfling, smoothed his green velvet jacket and gazed down from the Great Hall mezzanine at the ballroom floor below where dancing figures performed intricate steps to the music of fiddles and lutes. Just as card-sharps were compelled by nature to cheat, and glow-worms unable not to glow, the Fae lived to dance. Even a simple crossing from table to cupboard was accomplished with a lightness of foot Gene Kelly or Barishnacoff would drool over.

He drew deeply on his cigar. Cuban. Smuggled in by one of Her Majesty's minions, a nixie or pixie, he still couldn't remember which was which.

It wasn't such a bad place at that, he mused. He'd always enjoyed parties. Here almost every night some Lord This or Lady That hosted a gathering. Daytime meant attending another caucus where bigwigs plotted their next raid or _coup d'état_. He even was invited to join the Wild Hunt, but begged off to spare his bad back.

He took a sip of whiskey. Its rich, smoky flavor beat anything he'd tasted back 'home', and never caused a hangover no matter how much one overindulged. As for the women, well! Finding a bedmate was almost too easy. He took them on two, even three at a time. His back these days was sturdy enough for that.

Yesterday's assasination of John F. Kennedy had caused scarcely a ripple in Faerie. Kidnapped in June, he dodged Lee Harvey Oswald's bullet by a mere six months. No chance of someone taking a potshot at him here. No bullets existed. No guns. The iron needed to forge firearms and ammunition was as deadly as holy water to the Fae. Too bad about his half-brother, though. Jackie would have it pretty tough for a time. Worse, Caroline and little John-John would grow up without a father. He regretted that.

He chuckled softly as he recalled his outrage, and to be honest, outright terror, the night the Selkies came for him.

"We found a nice, quiet guest house right above the sea," Secret Service Agent Jerry Blaine had told him. "Private suite, private bath, great food." The innkeeper's daughter, a lovely, buxom colleen, proved delighted to provide the special service he solicited.

Jack Kennedy might be a Halfling, but he was no wuss. He fought like a spriggan - he'd met one or two since, and the simile was apt - to shake off the great bearded beings who burst into his bedchamber, naked and reeking of the sea. All those years playing football had taught him a trick or two. But they were three and he was one and in the end his back betrayed him. The beings with their webbed fingers pinioned his arms and stopped his shouts with a nasty seaweed gag.

"Come along, then," one captor said. "So long as ya behave, no harm'll come to ya."

He caught a glimpse of the other - his friggin' double - in the courtyard, chatting animatedly with Agent Blaine, demonstrating a goddammed football pass! Someone from God knew where - Russia or maybe even the damned Mafia - they meant to pass off as him.

Well, he'd told himself, Bobby would figure out what happened soon enough. Jackie would know in a heartbeat. The two of them would expose this bastard imposter. Put a stop to whatever scheme was planned for America. Then they'd send the rescue squad. Green Berets. Or the Navy SEALS. Who'd damn well show these lunatics you can't kidnap the president of the United States and get away with it.

As his captors hustled him down to the shore, he was already working on his speech thanking his rescuers for their swift response and praising their valorous actions. Then, to his utter bewilderment, his captors rummaged among the rocks and tide pools where each found a thick fur cloak that enveloped their muscular bodies like a second skin. One by one in their seal forms, the Selkies slipped away into the sea.

The woman who arrived after the Selkies departed wore a garment more moonlight than textile. Her long dark hair swirled softly, as if stirred by a breeze he could not discern. She smiled, not quite showing the teeth he would learn were a bit too pointed for a human female.

"Come with me, Jack. It's time to see your new home."

When he clasped her long-fingered hand, somehow what transpired in the world he came from faded into insignificance. No, his new home, this land of the Fae, wasn't a bad place at all.

It was his last thought before the first stone-tipped arrow pierced his aorta, the second smashed through his ribs and penetrated his heart.

THE END


End file.
